


Kiev

by Agaryulnaer, sarisa



Series: Interlude [3]
Category: Inception (2010)
Genre: Hurt/Comfort, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-12-14
Updated: 2011-12-13
Packaged: 2017-10-27 07:46:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 27,366
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/293369
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Agaryulnaer/pseuds/Agaryulnaer, https://archiveofourown.org/users/sarisa/pseuds/sarisa
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After doing a job outside of dreamshare as a favor for a friend, Arthur follows Eames to Kiev, a bit worse for wear.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

It's fucking cold.

 

 _Goddamn Kiev,_  Arthur thinks, too tired for even his mental voice to sound particularly annoyed. _Why Kiev? Why not Marseilles, or Barcelona, or Cape Town, or somewhere nice and hot at this time of year, with beaches, an ocean?_ No, it had to be Kiev, with its frigid temperatures, dozens of degrees below freezing in December, and blowing snowdrifts. Dirty snowdrifts, he corrects himself, as he's hit in the side with slush as a car goes by him, swearing under his breath.

 

Then again, he's had enough of sand. A month's worth of it. Maybe a beach wouldn't be the best place to be right now. At least there'll probably be a heater, where he's going. He hasn't slept in a day or so, even on the train, and although things haven't hit the point where they're blurry yet, he can tell when he's getting close to that. But all he'd been able to think, when they'd finally gotten out, when it had been finished and he could leave, go home, go anywhere... it wasn't so much a place he'd needed to find, at that point, as a person.

 

A person halfway to the other side of the globe at that point, but that hadn't seemed like such an obstacle at the time. He's used to that, to ridiculously large distances and never staying in one place for too long. And now he's gone from sand and blinding sun, blistering heat to a cold beyond shivering in the space of only three days, all told... but the faces still won't leave his mind. If there was anything to throw up in his stomach, yet, he'd be retching in the gutter.

 

He takes the stairs once he finally finds the building, the Cyrillic a bit harder than usual to decipher, and jogs up four flights to try to warm up. Finding the correct door, he knocks twice, sharply. It opens, and he stands there just looking tired... and perhaps, being met with that much shock, a bit embarrassed. "What is it with you and fucking snow?"

 

“Forgive me, I should have known to go somewhere sans snow. Next time I will be prepared,” Eames responds after a moment, recovering quickly from the mild shock of seeing Arthur standing outside his hotel room in Kiev. Well, mostly recovering; the surprise is still evident there as he steps back, allowing the other man in. For one thing, it’s frigid out there, and he hasn’t got any socks or shoes on, just sweatpants and a sweater (in all sorts of horrific bright colors. It looks like someone knitted it by hand, poorly, and was also colorblind). For another, Arthur looks like he’s about a half a second from passing out.

 

Eames shuts the door behind him, eyeing the other man; he hadn’t been sleeping, but he’d been settled in for the night, despite the fact that it’s only evening. Eames hadn’t had any plans for the night, which, he decides, is just as well. He hopes he hadn’t fallen asleep and is dreaming this. Seems unlikely, since he doesn’t dream naturally. Granted, he is working a job at the moment, he doesn’t know, perhaps he’d just forgotten… but that doesn’t make any sense…

 

“You look halfway to unconscious, darling,” he says after a moment’s inspection. “More than halfway. Most of the way.”

 

"I'm getting there," Arthur says quietly, dragging a hand through his hair and closing his eyes for a second. It makes him sway, but he shoves the hair back out of his face anyway, scowling tiredly at it. "It was a long trip." Two days' worth, he thinks... he's not entirely sure what day it is. He turns to look at Eames, but he's too tired to figure out the other man's expression.

 

He hadn't exactly _meant_ to just... show up on Eames' doorstep. But he's so tired, all of him, and with the thought capacity he had... this was the only place he could think of to go. His chin itches, has for a week since he'd lost his razor, and by the time the job had finally been over, he'd given up on caring about finding another one. He scratches his jaw a bit, absently, and flinches when he recalls that lifting that arm might not be the best plan.

 

"Sorry for just showing up." As though he'd just stopped by on his way home from work for the night, because it had been on the way... He doesn't even know why he's here. What had he been thinking? That Eames would open the door and tackle him, and... what? He could cry his heart out on the other man's shoulder, like he's never seen people killed before? This is ridiculous. He looks away.

 

Strangely worried for any number of reasons, Eames spends a moment just watching Arthur silently, cataloging all of the things that are wrong in one way or another: he appears not to have shaved for long enough for a substantial beard to start growing, which is almost disturbing, not because it looks bad (it definitely does not), but because it’s very… un-Arthur-like. Something is clearly wrong with his arm. He seems not to have slept in days. Those are just the most obvious things. Eames isn’t sure he likes this at all, and the worry worsens when Arthur apologizes.

 

Actually, the worry is dropped completely for a moment. Beyond the surprise, if he weren’t suddenly worried for the other man, Eames would be thrilled by this development. He blinks at Arthur for a moment, but the other man isn’t looking at him. Eames wishes he would take off his coat. “Whatever for?” he asks, sounding genuinely startled. “If you can find me, and you always can, you’re welcome to show up.” Blanket statement inviting Arthur to show up whenever he so desires? Maybe he _is_ dreaming. Except something is clearly wrong, and Eames wants more than anything to make Arthur not wear that expression that almost isn’t one.

 

“If you didn’t look such a wreck, pet, I’d’ve had you up against the wall ten seconds ago. I still might, but you seem to have about thirty layers on and also you flinched just now. I find myself wary.” He frowns at Arthur’s arm, then reaches over to tug at the zipper of the other man’s coat. “Come on, off with it.”

 

It's a mark of how exhausted Arthur actually is, and how... well, just out of sorts, out of his usual sphere of calm control, that he lets Eames pull off his coat without so much as a token protest. He turns as Eames pulls it down over his shoulders and off of his arms, leaving him in just the clothes he'd been wearing when he'd left Africa. Which is to say two khaki-colored shirts that have seen better days, the outer one not even buttoned over the tee shirt, and pants that may once have been desert camouflage.

 

The tan shirt he's wearing over his tee shirt is noticeably cleaner than the rest of him, which is mostly explained by the bandage wrapped around his bicep and the fact that the shirt he'd had before had very abruptly had a bullet-hole in it. And a bit of blood... Even from behind, he can tell Eames is waiting for an explanation. "Kalashnikov," he says with a quiet sigh. "I didn't duck fast enough."

 

He clears his throat. "You can have me up against the wall all you want, but you'll probably have to hold me up at the moment."

 

Withholding a sigh, Eames shakes his head, although he does run his thumb almost absently just above the collar of Arthur’s shirt as he moves to the front of the other man. “I’d prefer to wait until you’re fully conscious,” he admits. And by that, he means until he’s fully convinced that the other man’s injury is healing properly. He trusts Arthur to have taken care of it, but no matter how good he is, the man’s not a doctor.

 

A Kalashnikov. Obviously he did not duck quite fast enough, no. Eames can tell that there is a story behind this, and that it is not a good one, but he doesn’t press. Not now especially, and maybe not ever. Arthur came here for a reason. Eames may not understand the man’s reasoning even slightly, but there you have it.

 “Come on,” he says after a moment’s inspection, reaching to take the other man’s uninjured arm. “You’re going to sleep, Arthur dear, and I’m going to check that bandage for you because I’m surprised you can see at all right now, and perhaps if you’re good when you wake up I’ll ravish you senseless, definitely before you shave.”

 

Following him obediently, Arthur chuckles. It's a quiet, slow sort of sound, as though it takes effort to convince each chuckle to leave his voice box, to prod his lungs into expelling the necessary air. "Only if I'm good?" He yawns, and the rest is said around it, making it marginally less wicked than he'd intended. "You like it when I don't behave."

 

He sits when nudged in the direction of the bed (unmade, and for once, all he can think is _thank_ _God_ , and not oh, of course it's not made, this is Eames' hotel room), and tugs off both shirts, wincing through the movement with the second one as he pulls it over his head. And then he proceeds to possibly fall asleep while sitting up as Eames unwraps the bandage from his arm.

 

It's cleaned and stitched, thanks to Chris' medic, and last he checked there hadn't been any redness. Just another hole in his arm; he hadn't had one in that arm, before, actually, so it's sort of a new thing. Unfortunately there's no matching hole on the other side of his bicep; Sanders digging that round out had not been a pleasant experience.

 

“Well,” Eames says quietly, possibly to himself, “I should at least give the illusion of expecting you to be good, or else your misbehaving would hardly be misbehaving at all.”

 

He thinks that’s reasonable, but Arthur might actually be asleep, and Eames is paying more attention to the wound than anything he’s saying. Sure enough, it looks clean, although still nasty enough to get a wince of sympathy out of Eames. He notes the lack of a hole on the other side of Arthur’s arm and winces again. That must have been a joy.

 

Still, it looks well enough for now, and Eames thinks it will be fine, provided Arthur stays on top of it, which he undoubtedly will (and if not, Eames will). So he re-wraps it, then after a moment, carefully pushes the other man down onto the mattress, deceptively gentle about it. He’ll probably remove Arthur’s shoes for him in a moment, but for now, getting him to sleep in the first place seems more important. “Go to sleep, darling. Remember what I said about being good.”

 

Hearing the word darling from Eames doesn't produce the shiver it usually does, even marginally awake as Arthur is at the moment, but it does make him smile very slightly as his head hits the pillow, his eyes closing the rest of the way. He hadn't thought he'd be able to smile, but there you have it. He would think more about this, but he drops off, then, the familiar blackness a welcome sensation after the past few weeks.

 

Arthur hasn't dreamed in three years and four months (he's counted to the day, actually) without being hooked up to a PASIV, but he still wakes up with his chest heaving, stomach churning, and shoves himself out of the bed somewhere in the middle of the night, fumbling in the darkness for the bathroom. Fluorescent light flickers on a moment later, spilling into the rest of the hotel room, as do the sounds of Arthur dry-heaving into the toilet bowl. It would be less dry-heaving and more puking if he'd eaten anything recently, but as luck would have it, he has not.

 

 He flushes anyway, rinsing his mouth out at the sink and then spitting and swearing viciously, trying to keep it under his breath. "Fuck. Fuck fuck fuck fuck."

 

 He does a fairly good job keeping quiet, but by this point Eames is already sitting up in bed, blinking at the light flooding out of the bathroom and wondering blearily what the fuck is going on. It takes him a moment to recognize the sounds, but when he does, worry hits him again hard enough to wake him the rest of the way, and Eames climbs out of the bed then, waiting for the cursing to subside a bit before wandering towards the bathroom.

 

He wanders loudly enough that he knows he won’t surprise Arthur when he appears in the doorway, not wanting to be nosy so much as wanting to be certain he isn’t dying or his wound bleeding again. All looks marginally well, from what Eames can see, except obviously something is not well. And despite curiosity being a large character trait of Eames’, he doesn’t ask. He can tell when something is bad and when it is worse. Especially with Arthur, which… is odd.

 

“There’s an extra toothbrush in the mirror cabinet,” he says quietly, then moves away from the doorway to wander back in the general direction of the bed and afford Arthur some privacy unless he suggests otherwise.

 

 Arthur doesn't respond, but after a minute he does get the toothbrush down, and brushes his teeth thoroughly. The movements are habit, ingrained in him, and that much is comforting.

 

 Had he dreamt? He doesn't know. He doesn't remember dreaming... although now that he's awake, he remembers the rest.

 

 He breathes in, then out, and it's marginally less shaky. When he feels like he can move without falling over or possibly curling up into a ball and crying, he returns to the bed, which is much smaller than the standard American hotel Queen. That, however, is not a bad thing, and it means he has an excuse to seek out Eames' warmth once he's back under the covers, finding only sweatpants and warm skin.

 

 It takes an effort, far more of one than it should, not to curl up in the fetal position, but again, he manages. "I owed Chris," he says quietly. "He called in the favor. We were even, but... I stayed. It wasn't done." Now, he doesn't know. It hadn't been a favor to Chris to stay, either. They'd found... what they'd found, and every man on the team had decided to stay and finish it. It had taken weeks, but they'd done it.

 

 Not sure how to respond to that, Eames nods silently. He has no idea who Chris is, but accepts the fact that Arthur owed him a favor with no surprise. It happens, and Arthur would make good on it. That doesn’t surprise him. But the rest… what would make Arthur stay after he’d evened the score with this Chris? What that would have him waking up trying to empty an already empty stomach?

 

Eames doesn’t have it in him to ask, to push Arthur to tell him. He just stays silent, because Arthur knows that he _can_ tell him. Arthur’s secrets have been treated like Eames’ secrets: as sacrosanct. Eames wouldn’t misuse that knowledge any more than he’d tell a stranger his own life story. Eames hasn’t said it in so many words, but Arthur knows. And he knows that in some cases, Eames won’t push.

 

 But he does make his presence known, reaching over carefully and unashamedly to put an arm around the other man, pulling him closer. It’s cold, after all, if Arthur wants to pretend that’s why Eames had done it.

 

 And so he does, at least for a couple of minutes, lying there tense as a rock (not because Eames is touching him, though, which should be a relief but right now really isn't, mostly because he doesn't know if relief is possible). Finally, though, the ridiculousness hits him, combined with the bone-deep weariness that he hasn't been able to shake since leaving Africa. He shuffles closer, unashamedly curling himself into the other man's chest, and feels Eames' arm tighten. His forehead presses into the forger's shoulder, harder than he'd meant to, and finally, very, very slowly, his muscles start to relax.

 

 And it isn't weakness, he tells himself exhaustedly. It isn't weakness to admit that you can't do something, and right now, he can't lie here alone, not and stay sane. It doesn't make him weak to feel safe now, for the first time in weeks, even though he's perfectly capable of defending himself, as he'd demonstrated, too many times to count. And it isn't weakness to admit that... this is why he'd bolted across the better part of two continents to Kiev with nightmares at his heels. This is what he'd come for.

 

"Thank you," he whispers. He doesn't move an inch, but he feels as though that needs to be said. Gratitude for Eames being there, when Arthur had needed him, even if he'd been unable to say it. Even if it's ridiculous that the point man should need anyone... but he does, he's only human, and here he is.

 

 Half-burying his face in Arthur’s hair, Eames is silent again for a long moment after that, just holding on to him and feeling his muscles relax, finally. The worry he’d been feeling since Arthur had appeared the evening before (must only have been a few hours) doesn’t go away, but… well. It helps, a little, feeling like he’s able to do something besides shoving the other man into bed and checking to be certain he wasn’t bleeding from the gunshot wound on his arm.

 

 He doesn’t really know what to say to that, doesn’t know what the thank you is for exactly. He hadn’t really thought about anything; he’d just… wanted to help. He doesn’t know why Arthur had come here, exactly, but he doesn’t question it, either. People don’t come to him. No one else would have. If anyone else had shown up the evening before, Eames would have bolted. He doesn’t know why he didn’t, really, except for years he’d always assumed Arthur could find him with relative, almost magical, ease. And… he’d looked a mess… in so many ways.

 

What Eames wants to say is that he’s glad Arthur is okay, or that he’ll always be there. But the idea that he will always be there for Arthur is a mildly terrifying one, and Eames doesn’t want to be terrified right now, he wants to keep Arthur relaxed and see if he can share his body heat, because that’s all he really has to offer. And so what he says instead is, “I’m glad you found me.”

 

 Arthur's breath is steadier against his shoulder. "So am I." And now he's afraid to sleep again. Will he dream? Have a nightmare? He's not even sure he did before, it doesn't make sense that he would... but regardless of whether or not he will, his eyes close of their own accord after only a few minutes, and his breathing evens out as he slips into sleep again.

 

He wakes twice more through the night. Each time, Eames is still there, and still holding him... and he manages to avoid another trip to the bathroom, manages to keep his stomach where it is. But each time he wakes, his heart is racing as though he's run five miles, and he's covered in sweat despite the chill in the room. Still, though... he falls asleep again each time, and after the last finally reaches the point beyond sleep and into unconsciousness, his brain giving out for a few hours.

 

By the time he wakes the next day, Eames is climbing out of bed, and he rolls over to watch him head for the bathroom, eyes at half-mast. "Morning," he says hoarsely, once the toilet flushes and the forger reappears.

 

“Morning,” Eames replies through a yawn, wandering back over towards the bed and promptly climbing right back in. He has no intentions of going back to sleep, but it is too cold out there, and although he really should get up, he doesn’t really want to just yet. A bed with Arthur in it, even after a night like that, is a very inviting bed, after all.

 

He’d woken, as well, several times; Eames isn’t sure that Arthur had actually gotten much sleep until late, nearly morning. Then again, it’s almost not morning anymore, now. So perhaps he had gotten some sleep. He certainly looks much better this morning than he had the night before. “You look much improved."

 

 Arthur nods, reaching up to drag a hand through his hair, and then wincing at the knots. "I feel better." And in very drastic need of a shower, if he's not mistaken. But like Eames, he has no desire to actually get out of the bed yet. Not just because the room is fucking cold, although that's a factor. But the major factor, the one that actually matters, has just climbed back under the covers with him, and he figures this is a good place to be.

 

He stares up at the ceiling for a few minutes, his brain slowly waking up, and then looks over at Eames, who is watching him unabashedly. Arthur stares back, one brow going up. "There was talk of walls, and having people against them," he observes after a moment. He wants to feel Eames' arms around him again, but he really has no preference as to how that comes about. "Unless I dreamt that."

 

 All right, maybe he has a preference, and it's in a slightly different manner than they'd been 'round him during the night. But that's not a crime.

 

Eames’ smile appears quickly and disappears a moment later, disguised by a very serious expression as he regards Arthur and realizes not for the first time since last night, that he had missed the other man much more than he’d let on, even to himself. “I suppose you did behave yourself,” he says gravely, moving closer until they’re touching under the covers. It’s too cold to be outside of them for long right now, but Eames has all sorts of plans to make the cold not an issue.

 

“The wall can wait, though,” he says, leaning in to snake an arm around the other man that he uses to pull him close enough to kiss. After all, he promised something about ravishing, and they have a perfectly nice bed to start in right here.

 

This Arthur does not disagree with in the least, although he feels as though he should lodge a cursory protest. "I was told... wall," he mumbles around Eames' tongue. But his hands are already going for the drawstring of Eames' sweatpants, even as he gets the words out, and he has no arguments against being pushed over onto his back and pressed down into the mattress. None whatsoever, so long as he gets to keep biting Eames' neck.

 

Sometime later, his arm is throbbing, but he's far too boneless to do anything about it. Well, anything more than leaning up and licking at the bruises he'd left, not feeling guilty in the least. It earns him a shiver, and he smirks, feeling accomplished. Then, after a moment, vaguely guilty. "Hope you didn't have work to do, today." Since it's, according to the clock, already afternoon. His internal clock is completely fucked by this point; in the time zone in which he'd spent the past month, it would still be mid- or late morning.

 

Eames makes a noncommittal noise at that, allowing his brain a moment to catch up. Work to do, did he have work to do? It takes Eames a moment to realize that technically he probably did, but not on any sort of strict timetable. Generally he is not given strict timetables, because he has a tendency to work in the middle of the night if the mood hits him, or to spend entire days hung over and useless. On the other hand, when given a timetable that he thinks is reasonable, Eames will stick to it.

 

In this instance, though, Eames is not entirely certain he wouldn’t have just told anyone expecting him to do anything to piss off. But he doesn’t say that. “Nothing I can’t do later,” he assures Arthur, which is the truth. He has absolutely no intentions of doing any work at this particular moment, and he knew very well when he woke up that he wasn’t about to be doing any then, either. He has his priorities in order.

 

 He grins, stretching a little. He is definitely very obviously bruised, and Eames doesn’t mind that at all. “I had better things to do.” Like Arthur.

 

"Valued above work." Arthur leans in and begins blowing on the places where he'd bruised the other man. "I'm flattered, Eames." His voice is hoarse, but his smile, in contrast to his non-expression the night before, is genuine.

 

His stomach rumbles, but he makes no move to get out from under the covers. He may very well attempt to restrain Eames should he try to leave, as well. He doesn't know how successful he'd be, since his own strength is nearly tapped, but he'd at least make the attempt. He may be hungry, yes, but the actual idea of food doesn't seem all that attractive at the moment. That's probably not a good thing, but there are more important things to worry about just now. Like how good Eames smells. That's an important one.

 

“As well you should be, Arthur,” Eames replies in kind, once he’s done shivering from the treatment Arthur is giving his bruises. Lord, the man is trying to kill him and he will go to his death happily. It’s really quite terrible. So awful, in fact, that Eames ends his stretching by throwing a leg around Arthur’s, pulling them closer and managing to burrow further into the pillow, which of course gives Arthur further access to carry on with what he was doing.

 

He seems to have little intention of getting out of bed, so no force is necessary. Although Eames does begin to wonder when the last time the other man had eaten might have been. No doubt it is not terribly recent, since he seemed to have been retching up nothing at all the night before. Eventually he’ll have to eat, though, and Eames might even try to force eating upon him. But not just yet. Not when, through the one eye he’s left open, Eames can see a smile on Arthur’s face. A rare occurrence, although not as rare as Eames had once thought it was, but after the night before… well. It’s reassuring. Eames is under no delusion that things are suddenly fixed, but a smile means that they can be.

 

With one eye, Eames watches Arthur for a moment, not bothering to fight his own fairly content smile, before finally referring to the observation he’s made several times since Arthur’s appearance. “The beard isn’t a bad look on you, pet. Of course, neither is nakedness, that might have created a bias, but I can’t be sure.”

 

Arthur chuckles, making a small face and rubbing at his furred chin. "It itches," he mutters, going back to blowing on (and then licking, again) Eames' bite marks. The latter causes the hair on his chin and throat to brush against the forger's skin, and he eyes the resulting shiver with no little interest. "Hmmm..."

 

His head drops back down, and he returns to what he'd been doing, moving down slowly away from the bruises and over Eames' stomach, the epitome of a damned six-pack (to his envious annoyance) and beyond. His head disappears below the covers, and he would remark at how much warmer it is, entirely beneath them... were his mouth not otherwise occupied at the moment.

 

As it happens, he finds that the beard is actually very useful. He might not shave it off immediately, after all.

 

Later, when Eames can finally think again- Arthur had thoroughly killed that ability for some time- Eames finds himself quite sold on the idea of a bearded Arthur. It had seemed a strange concept to him, before, no matter how it looked. But now it seems like a wonderful idea, even if it is only short-lived. Even so, it’s already been put to very good use.

 

“I’m sure now,” he admits, voice decidedly hoarse. “I am quite fond of this look.”

 

Chuckling again, Arthur lays his head on the forger's stomach, not wanting to leave his warm space beneath the blankets. But eventually his head does reappear, eyes amused. 'Thought you might be."

 

His stomach rumbles again and he groans under his breath, burying his face in the pillow. He's not hungry. It can shut up now, because he has no desire to eat something and only puke it up again.

 

Eames hears the groan as clearly as the stomach rumbling, and withholds a sigh. That would be his cue to prod the other man into eating something. He recognizes it well. Much as he doesn’t want to bring Arthur’s attention to anything outside of lying about in bed and getting up to all manner of filthy, wonderful things, it must be done eventually. He also would prefer that Arthur not starve due to avoidance.

 

 “You really ought to try to eat something,” he says after a moment to the back of the point man’s head. “It actually is not possible to subsist solely on sex, no matter how great it is. I’m sure of it.”

 

Arthur mumbles something into his pillow that sounds like it might be, "I can try." But he does turn his head to look at Eames, resigned. He doesn't want to move. He's so tired, and he knows that he would feel better, eating something, but he's just not sure if he can manage.

 

 Then again, this whinging sort of behavior isn't truly like him, is it? Since when has he eschewed what he needs to do in favor of a whim?

 

 "Fine," he mumbles, sitting up and dragging a hand through his hair. "I'll try."

 

“Great,” Eames says, sitting up as well after a moment. He casts around his memory, trying to recall if he has… anything at all that might sit well on an empty, sick stomach. He has… vodka in the desk drawer… half a bag of M&M’s… and bread. Right. Grocery shopping was not one of the things he’s done recently. Living out of a hotel is a very good reason not to.

 

 This does present a problem. “Unless plain bread and M&M’s is to your liking, I’ve nothing here but vodka.” He might have gone if he’d known he’d have Arthur to feed. “I’ll run to the store up the street. I need water bottles anyway. The hotel water doesn’t strike me as the most drinkable tap water.”

 

Looking a bit disgusted by the idea of eating plain bread, Arthur nods. That sounds good to him. "I might shower," he says, sliding his feet over the side of the bed reluctantly. It would probably be better for everyone if he stopped smelling like he hasn't bathed in... well, longer than he'd care to think about. A shower would be cleansing in more ways than one.

 

Eames says something else, getting up and dressing and then coming over to touch his shoulder; he nods, not comprehending but agreeing to whatever it is anyway (a dangerous proposition, that) and walks naked into the bathroom, climbing into the shower without preamble. The water stays hot, which is a miracle in itself, and he uses Eames' soap, Eames' shampoo, Eames' towel and deodorant. By the end of it, he smells more like Eames than Arthur, and for some reason that is reassuring. He'd rather be Eames and not Arthur just now.

 

The actual Eames reappears some time later, bag-laden and looking glad to be in out of the cold. Despite the fact that Eames produces an obnoxious amount of body heat, Kiev still isn’t exactly tropical, even for him. The room is relatively warm, after the trip out, and Eames is glad to be back in it, and to find Arthur still there, not a dream after all. And bathed, if the wet hair is any indication.

 

Shedding the coat, Eames drops the bags onto the desk. “Water and Gatorade,” he says, suspecting that after all of the blood loss and retching that Arthur will need the Gatorade, “and soup and crackers and butter for the bread. Also peanuts, but they might be a bit oily.” Eames had done his very best to find foods that wouldn’t be as likely to upset Arthur’s stomach, and so he lists only those foods he’d bought which he thinks fit into that category.

 

Looking up from where he'd dropped down onto the couch (which has definitely seen better days) to stare at the television, Arthur blinks at the food. "Thank you," he says after a moment, clearly meaning it even if the words are quiet. His eyes drift back to the television after a moment, to the newscaster's voice chattering quickly in Russian about a crisis that had taken place just days ago in West Africa.

 

There are photos of dead soldiers, of people in civilian clothes holding rifles and one man in a military uniform giving a speech at a press conference. Arthur's expression does not change, mostly since he has reverted to not wearing one; his face might have been carved from stone. One warlord dead. What a tragedy. See his grief.

 

His thanks receive a nod from Eames but not much more. There’s the non-expression again, and he isn’t particularly happy to see it making a reappearance. But at the same time… Eames finds he isn’t particularly surprised. A night’s sleep and (admittedly great) sex aren’t going to fix whatever had brought Arthur here in the first place. This favor for Chris which turned into something awful enough to have had him come here in the state he arrived in.

 

 Eames’ Russian is not so bad, especially after having spent so much time here recently; he makes out what the newscaster is saying even as he puts things away, not having much of anything to say without prying. A West African warlord dead. This would be completely irrelevant to him were Arthur not watching it. In fact, it seems as though it should be completely irrelevant to Arthur as well, which makes the fact that he is sitting there, watching it in stony silence, telling enough that Eames begins to wonder.

 

He lets the newscaster carry on until the story changes to something about a local politician sleeping with underage male prostitutes, and which point Eames has run out of things to put away and excuses to remain oddly silent. “Do you think you might try something?” he asks, because food is a much less horrible topic than whatever it is Arthur hasn’t told him.

 

"Yeah," Arthur agrees after a moment. He clicks the remote, changing the channel to some inane cartoon and then getting up to look over what Eames had brought back. "You frighten me sometimes. It wouldn't kill you to eat a salad. Or some protein." This is more normal conversation than they've had since he arrived, and it's clear that he's making the effort, pushing the darkness that is continually threatening to swallow him to the back of his mind.

 

He takes the crackers, rolling his eyes when Eames appears to be deciding to feast just on buttered bread and candy.

 

Accepting this conversation as what it is- a diversion- Eames carries on happily enough. He might be a curious bastard but he’s not an idiot. He’s going to leave it alone unless Arthur says something. So he carries on buttering bread and wondering what color M&M he should eat next, as he’s already picked out all the red ones.

 

“It wouldn’t kill me,” Eames agrees, and carries on with what he’s doing. No matter what Arthur thinks, he eats protein. Sometimes. Not so much salads. It’s just that he tends to snack on things consistently and then binge on occasion, forgoing the more traditional idea of “meals” in favor of “I’m hungry so I’m going to eat.” This fits much better with the sort of lifestyle that means often eating breakfast or lunch would be put off until two pm for reasons to do with alcohol consumption.

 

He stuffs an entire piece of bread into his mouth and finishes chewing and swallowing before Arthur has even gone back to his seat. Then he eyes the M&Ms. “Green or orange?”

 

 "That's revolting," Arthur says, staring at him in disgust and eyeing bread crumbs caught in the other man's stubble. "And neither. Brown and blue are the best."

 

Making a bit of a face, he returns to the sofa, staring at the cartoon and trying to decipher what they're saying; it shouldn't be as difficult as it is, since his Russian while not fluent isn't terrible, but their voices are high-pitched and they're speaking abnormally quickly. It takes him a moment to realize that this is actually an American cartoon, dubbed. "Isn't this those... powder puff girls?" He's obviously not so up on cartoon culture.

 

Smiling pleasantly at Arthur’s disgust, Eames thoroughly ignores his answer, following the other man to the sofa with his candy and beginning the long and arduous process of picking through the bag to find the green ones. Brown and blue. Blue he can understand, but brown? No one likes the brown ones. Who does Arthur think he’s fooling?

 

He doesn’t ignore the question though, looking up at the television. “It’s power puff,” he explains. Clever wordplay, that. “They’ve magical powers. You can tell as they fly everywhere and seem to leave behind a streak of laser beam or some such.” Eames clearly has seen this show before. He does tend to watch television just for the sake of watching television, or because he can’t or won’t move from his bed or couch. But generally he prefers television with actual actors. Soap operas, for one, are strangely intriguing. But Eames generally goes more for movies.

 

"Ah," Arthur says succinctly, not disputing the fact that Eames almost certainly has more knowledge of that sort of thing than he does. As often point out, he has no imagination, especially when it comes to this sort of thing. That fact bothers him, but he's usually content to leave the creativity to those best suited for it. He likes the History Channel, and the Military Channel. Sometimes Discovery, or Travel. Interesting things.

 

Still, he can't help but glance over at the green M&Ms being shovelled into Eames' mouth with impressive speed, considering that he has to pick them out individually. "The brown ones are the best," he points out. "They taste extra chocolate-y."

 

Eames eyes him, although he doesn’t pause mid-pawing through the bag for the green ones. “I’ve never met a single person who cared for the brown ones until just now,” he says, suspicious. It’s the truth, not that he goes around discussing M&M preferences with everyone he meets, although he supposes he could. It’s just an odd-sounding preference. “I think you’re putting me on.”

 

More chocolate-y. That is certainly not something he has ever noticed before. But then, he doesn’t often get to the brown ones before giving up and eating them all at once. Which is certainly very chocolate-y, as it is then a handful of chocolate disguised very poorly by candy coatings. And so Eames says nothing about it, but pauses in his green-M&M-quest to thoughtfully try a brown one on its own. “Hmm.”

 

 Arthur smirks a little, trying very hard to maintain his amusement. It works, after some effort, and he leans over against Eames, setting aside the crackers and reaching into the bag to pull out a handful of candy. He doesn't move away once he has, either.

 

"I can't say I've had M&Ms very often since reaching adulthood," he says finally. "But that was my reasoning when I was a kid. The brown ones are chocolate-colored, and so they taste more like chocolate." There used to be two browns, he remembers that, too.

 

“I suppose that’s good reasoning,” Eames allows after another test, doing a rather poor job of keeping a smile to himself as Arthur leans against him. Things had gotten better for Arthur, at least between the two of them, during their time spent in Florence. But that doesn’t mean Eames forgets the significance of such simple-seeming acts as leaning against someone. It’s the contrary, really. It makes it less simple and more meaningful, and the fact that time apart hasn’t ruined that is relieving.

 

As for M&Ms, and childhood, well. Eames eyes Arthur’s handful, then the green and brown ones he’d just pulled out for himself in his own hand. “I ate them all at once as a child,” he says almost offhandedly, and doesn’t pause to wonder what had changed. “I think most adults could do with eating more candy now and then.” There’s something intrinsically youthful about candy.

 

Smiling slightly, Arthur doesn't disagree, although he remains quiet, staring at the television and trying not to think about children in a general sense. Thus far he's avoided bringing back the memories he would rather not revisit, and so he concentrates on trying to decipher the inane plot of the cartoon.

 

It appears that a monster is attempting to invade the city, and so the magic cartoon girls go and defeat it. As expected, it ends happily, and makes him sigh a little. "It would be nice if things always wrapped up neatly with the bad guys defeated in real life, too," he says after a bit, responding far too late to the candy conversation.

 

Sensing that that comment is a bit more meaningful than is typical, Eames doesn’t bring up the point that they are often the “bad guys.” By law, they most certainly are just that. But on a scale, a real human scale, they’re not as bad as all that. There is much worse out there. On the other hand, that much worse doesn’t tend to look like the monster on this cartoon.

 

“Yes,” Eames agrees instead. “On the other hand, it would also be a lot easier for that to occur if people had super powers.”

 

"All you have to do is hook yourself up to a PASIV," Arthur points out, amused. "You can be superman if you want." Of course, he himself hasn't really _played_ in a dream for... years. Not since he'd first been introduced to dream-sharing, before the consequences had become apparent...

 

"The world would be destroyed if humanity actually had superpowers." He has no faith in the human race as a whole, at the moment. "Human nature would cause us to destroy ourselves."

 

“Well, not everyone would have superpowers,” Eames points out, a bit worried by such a blanket statement regarding the human race. “Then they wouldn’t be superpowers at all. Quirks, perhaps.”

 

Everyone having powers, after all, defeats the point of superpowers. But he can certainly see the point. If every single person had the ability to fly or burn buildings to the ground with their minds, mind control… it would dissolve into chaos quickly. “Hooking oneself up to a PASIV is no more superpower-inducing than writing a movie script or painting. It’s only an outlet for what already exists in the human subconscious.” He pauses. “Although I can’t say I’d mind giving flying a go.”

 

"I took you for wanting to be able to turn invisible," Arthur teases, although the jibe doesn't have its usual teeth, which isn't necessarily a bad thing. "Spying on girls' locker rooms and all. But my point is that it's all well and good to do impossible things in a dream. But the world is safer without people with superpowers. Without anyone who can do superhuman things."

 

Comic books are all well and good, sure, but in real life, he'd prefer everyone at least be on somewhat even footing, physically.

 

“Spying on locker rooms…” Eames says thoughtfully. Turning invisible wouldn’t be so bad, now that he thinks about it. But then, he thinks, none of these things would be the super power he’d have. It’s obvious that he would have some sort of shapeshifting ability. Almost painfully obvious. But there’s no need to carry on with that.

 

“You’re undoubtedly right,” he says after a moment, “People do have a tendency to muck things up even without any abnormal abilities. On the other hand, Einstein had abnormal intelligence and he didn’t do so badly.”

 

 "He created the atomic bomb," Arthur counters dryly. "I don't know what could be worse than that was."

 

Honestly, he doesn't. But his mindset isn't exactly a positive one at the moment. "We're all fucked. It's just a matter of when it happens, and how nasty it is when it does. It's bad enough just with normal people in the world. All well and good to think up imaginary heroes who save the world and all, but that doesn't do anyone much good except people who watch cartoons and buy comic books."

 

Despite the fact that maybe Einstein was a poor choice of example, Eames can’t help but feel that Arthur’s current feelings on all of this are a little more extreme than usual. Eames himself isn’t a particularly loud proponent of the “all people are good deep down” philosophy, and maybe surprisingly (from an outsider’s perspective) is more pragmatist than idealist. But right now, Arthur is making him look like bloody Walt Disney.

 

Normally, Eames would make a comment about Arthur being too cheerful, but this is not a normal conversation. All it seems to be doing is stirring up his already substantial worries.

 

“Better to imagine heroes than the opposite, I suppose,” Eames says, noncommittally.

 

Arthur snorts. "They're few and far between," he mutters, even though he knows that's not fair. But it feels that way. He's certainly not one, that's for sure. The blood he'd spilled in the past month is testimony to that, even if he'd had a reason for spilling it. That kind of revenge doesn't generate heroics, only more bloodshed.

 

"Anything stronger than beer in there?" he asks after a moment, nodding to the mini-fridge.

 

“No,” Eames says, looking up from his M&Ms in the general direction of the mini-fridge. All of the things that had been in there were done for a week ago at least.

 

After a moment of silence, Eames looks up to find Arthur looking at him disbelievingly. The forger blinks at him, pops a couple of the green candies into his mouth, and then asks (incredulously), “What? I keep the vodka in the desk drawer. You ought to be more _specific_.”

 

Rolling his eyes and elbowing Eames in the stomach, the point man hoists himself to his feet, heading for the desk drawer and finding a half-empty liquor bottle. "I'll pay you back," he mutters, unscrewing the cap and taking a swig. It's strong as hell, and he clears his throat after he sets it down, blinking a few times.

 

 "Did you buy it specifically to take off a layer of your stomach lining?"

 

“Yes,” Eames says without missing a beat, “I never much cared for that layer. It grows back, doesn't it?”

 

 Eames has no idea about stomach linings, although he did just get elbowed in his stomach, which was unfair. That is about all he has to say on the subject of stomachs for today. “This is Kiev, pet, you won’t find watered-down vodka unless they’re using it to clean out a cut.”

 

 That's fair enough, and Arthur says so, taking another- albeit smaller- swig from the bottle. "Fair enough. I appreciate you not splashing any on my arm." It's throbbing a lot less just now, as it happens.

Oh, the wonders of strong alcohol. He's barely eaten anything; he'll be drunk embarrassingly quickly if he keeps going at this rate.

 

He drops back down onto the couch, this time close enough that he nearly lands on Eames, and offers the other man the bottle.

 

Surprisingly, Eames shakes his head. Obviously he’s already had some of the bottle, but not today. “Duty calls,” he explains, wondering what it means that it’s odd that he’s the one abstaining. He supposes the drunken voicemails he left the other man have left an impression. And what an impression he seems to have made. “Mustn’t be tipsy on the job. Ought to at least pretend to professionalism.”

 

Then again, he pretends to everything, in one way or another. Eventually, something or other has to be true, and in this case, it is. Eames is very dedicated to the jobs he takes. “Anyway, I wouldn’t waste good vodka on an already-sanitized arm. How is the arm today?”

 

Arthur takes another swallow from the bottle, then closes it for the moment, setting it on the coffee table. "No infection." Or at least, there hadn't been any when he'd showered, none that he could see. The stitches are holding up fairly well, it seems, and he's probably all right for a while. He'd re-wrapped it when he'd finished washing, and it seems to be doing all right. Hurts rather a lot, but that's to be expected, and he's not going to admit to being in pain to Eames.

 

"A few weeks and it'll be good as new. New scar, anyway." He eyes the forger sidelong. "If you need to work, go ahead. I'm not going anywhere."

 

A new scar, well, Eames can’t think of a better way to put it, and so says nothing. He’s just glad to hear that there’s no infection. Eames shows his relief by redoubling his efforts in pawing through the bag of M&Ms, which at this point has just become something to do with his hands.

 

 Eames eyes Arthur right back. “I’ve been working here,” he admits. “Preliminary stages involve getting into a back room at Salut International Casino. With untraceable chips.” Money, of course, is completely traceable. So the trick is to get chips without paying for them with credit or cash. Naturally, this is where Eames comes in. Well, that, and then using them at the poker table. Eames shakes his head a bit. “The chips take a regrettably long time.”

 

Arthur's brows are now raised. "But worth the millions you'll win at the poker table?" he asks drily. It's an ambitious scheme, for whoever had put it together, but... hm. There's a question he hadn't asked.

 

Well. He's been more or less out of contact with the rest of the world for a month. It's not surprising that he wouldn't know. "Did someone hire you or is it your con?"

 

“Oh, no,” Eames says, flashing a grin. “The big ones are never mine. That way if I get caught, there’s someone I can sell out in a plea bargain.”

 

He says this, of course, with a perfectly straight face, continuing to fish through his M&Ms without pause. Whether or not he’d actually do something of that nature to someone he’s been working a job with is left to Arthur to determine. The truth of it is, of course, that Eames doesn’t believe that he’ll get caught. He’s too good at disappearing if he is to stay caught.

 

The _real_ question here is where the hell was the omnipotent Arthur that he didn’t know this already? Of course, asking that would be too near to what Arthur is obviously trying to avoid for comfort, but Eames has some idea already. “There’s more to it, he needed an outsider, and he seems to be friendly with the blokes from Moscow.”

 

Arthur nods, arching a brow. "The ones you met while dog-napping? Or letting your mark's wife seduce you?" His expression is nearly grave, but the laughter is audible in his voice. "Or were they your karaoke partners?"

 

True enough that if he gets caught, he could plea-bargain out, but Arthur has no illusions about nearly any prison being able to hold Eames. Still, Arthur wouldn't envy him the experience. "More power to you, if you get tossed in a Ukrainian prison."

 

“Not my life’s goal, I’ll say that,” Eames admits. Still, he doesn’t seem terribly threatened by the idea of prison. He, too, believes fully in his ability to keep himself out of prison, or at least to get out.

 

And of course Arthur knows and remembers all of the good bits about Moscow. And is thoroughly amused. “Now, come on, I had very little to do with the dog-napping. It’s just that we needed a diversion quickly. And as for karaoke, I will never expound upon what you already know.” And the mark’s wife, well. That was his job, wasn’t it? Eames isn’t even slightly ashamed. You have to love your work.

 

 "Considering your taste in music, that's fine with me," Arthur retorts, leaning back into the sofa.

 

 It's nearing the end of the afternoon before they realize it; the time had gone quickly, sniping at each other as is their usual habit, but there's much less of an edge to the humor now, a trend which had started in Florence. And Arthur realizes, had realized then, as well, that he rather likes it this way.

 

 He's also partway to drunk, or so he thinks. He may actually be closer to being completely drunk than he realizes, but at the moment his mind is taken up by his diabolical plan to grope the forger, not that Eames appears to be complaining as his hand slides up the forger's back, underneath the ridiculous sweater. "Did someone knit this for you? Or did you buy it at a circus?"

 

Eames shoots him an affronted look at that. “Distaste at my choice of attire,” he says after a moment. “Unprecedented. Imagine my shock.” Of course, Eames has been enduring quips at the expense of his clothing since the moment he met Arthur. This would be more annoying to him if he hadn’t been trying to get Arthur out of his clothing since the moment they met as well. On the other hand, it was for a very different reason. Well, until recently. Arthur seems to have some similar intentions at this particular moment.

 

 “Honestly,” he says, and very nearly sighs, “what sort of pickup line is that? It’s very warm. That’s its purpose.”

 

 "Wasn't meant to be a pickup line." Arthur's mouth drifts over to his neck, above the sweater's neckline. "Don't need one; you're not going to say no." A simple statement of fact; Eames is not going to refuse him, no way in hell, and Arthur knows it. Smugly, he lets his hand run further up the forger's back, the other man's skin nice and warm. Which is helpful, since Arthur's hands are a tad frozen at the moment.

 

"Take it off and I'll keep you warm," he offers, voice muffled against Eames' stubble.

 

Despite the fact that at the moment, Arthur’s hands are so cold he is doing the opposite, the rest of what he’s doing makes Eames quite certain that he’s not lying. Not to mention his tone… Christ. Eames knows very well that he shouldn’t give in this easily to demands like that after being taunted regarding his taste in clothing, but… right. He has no willpower.

 

Arthur knows him frighteningly well. The sweater is off in about two seconds, tops.

 

 “We’ll see who is kept warm, darling,” Eames mumbles right back, and it comes out slightly muffled as he presses Arthur back into the sofa, attacking the other man's mouth with his own before Arthur can carry on with the mind-numbing things he always seems to do to Eames’ neck and jaw.

 

Some time later, Arthur wakes up somewhat, having dozed off... and finds himself on the floor between couch and coffee table, Eames mostly on top of him. They seem to have shifted the coffee table a bit to make space (he hopes, distantly, that they didn't break it), but right now he's very warm and couldn't care less.

 

 "My arm doesn't hurt," he muses, only slurring a little.

 

 This has Eames lifting his head up a little to eye Arthur’s arm, but it looks about the same as it’d looked earlier: like he’d been shot, but is recovering. No, that’s not a surprise borne of a sudden lack of feeling in his arm, but rather, slightly drunken surprise. Eames smiles a bit, unsurprised in that case, and turns his head back to lick a stripe up Arthur’s jaw to his ear.

 

“Very good news,” he says quietly. “Perhaps a good shag was the cure all along.” Or vodka. Eames’ bet is on the vodka, but he’d never say that.

 

Feeling Eames' teeth below his ear, Arthur makes a sound that could be described as nothing so much as a giggle; it's very brief, though, and he proceeds to shove Eames just below his ribs with his good hand; he flips them over with a clumsy sort of ease, promptly thwacking his head on the edge of the coffee table and groaning. " _Fuck_."

 

When he can see without spots again, he notes the forger trying not to laugh. "Shut up!"

 

 “I,” Eames manages to grit out without even one single laugh, “said not a word.”

 

 Saying even this much without bursting into a fit of hysterics takes a great deal of skill, but if Eames can’t keep himself from laughing with a bit of work, who could? This of course means nothing of the hilarity he is experiencing internally, nor how much the laughter is showing in his eyes. First of all, had Arthur just _giggled_? Good Lord, Eames hopes so. Him wounding himself wouldn’t be nearly so funny without the fact that he’d been in the middle of flipping them over while he’d done it. Not to mention the giggle. Did Eames mention that?

 

The point man's good hand connects with Eames' shoulder rather viciously a moment later, and he tries to shove himself up and off of the other man, making it as far as his knees before he's dragged back down. Swearing, he tries to break free of the other man's grasp, but being both shot and rather intoxicated, he is easily subdued by Eames. This doesn't mean he doesn't try to break free, however, and they wrestle for a minute or two before Arthur is finally pinned facedown in the carpet.

 

 And it's very difficult not to notice that Eames has enjoyed all of this activity. Of course, he's suffering from the same condition, but his isn't currently on display, at least. As it were. "I hate you," he mutters into the rug, not wanting to think about how dirty it is. He can't really do much else at the moment.

 

 Despite the fact that he’s mid-holding Arthur down, Eames smiles evilly and begins biting just a bit more than gently at Arthur’s back and shoulders. Drunken Arthur is both prone to giggling and easy to subdue. Eames is enamored. Charmed as hell, actually. And thoroughly doubts that this is a common occurrence. He feels a bit honoured.

 

 “You, Arthur dear, are a poor loser,” he says, punctuating that sentiment with another bite. His grin widens when one hand snakes beneath the other man and he finds that Arthur hardly minds this as much as he might make it out to be. “And a worse liar.”

 

Groaning under his breath and mumbling something about "damned recovery time," Arthur twists about again in an attempt to dislodge Eames, but only succeeds in driving himself a bit crazier. Escape attempt thus foiled, he subsides, not arguing when Eames continues to bite him.

 

 Nor does he know which way to move, forward into Eames' hand or back into the rest of him. It's a conundrum.

 

Needless to say, Eames has his way this time with very little actual protest from Arthur once he stops trying to fight Eames off for being an arse (he can admit it). Of course, they end up on the floor once again, inches from the comfort of the sofa, and Eames finds himself wondering distantly why in two goes they didn’t bother to perhaps move the meter over onto the damn thing, or maybe over to the bed.

 

Then again, they were a bit busy. They’re not, now, though, and although he feels boneless and generally pleasant all over, Eames knows it’s up to him to be the one to move either of them to the bed if they’re moving at all, because Arthur appears to be both tanked and exhausted. So after a few minutes’ worth of catching his breath, Eames shoves himself up onto his knees with a groan, pulling at Arthur’s arm.

 

“Come on, love, let’s lie in bed,” he suggests. “It’ll be frigid later if we fall asleep.”

 

A half-asleep Arthur, with a mostly-empty stomach and a high percentage of alcohol running through his veins, does not have the strength or the willpower to argue this, even on principle, because it makes a lot of sense to his sleepy brain. Even if it does mean he has to agree with Eames about something. Mutter mutter mutter.

 

He does mutter aloud, actually, when he manages to lever himself to his feet with some assistance (hard to do with one arm, actually) and stumble his way over to the bed. They fall onto the mattress, scrambling under the covers, and when Arthur's head hits the pillow his eyes close.

 

 But something Eames had said sticks with him in a way it likely wouldn't had he been more awake and aware. "'M I your love?" His eyes are closed, and it's barely comprehensible, but apparently his mind had noted the less-common endearment... and chooses to question it, without the benefit of his usual filter.

 

It's probably just as well that Arthur's eyes are closed, because Eames can't help that he pauses at that, staring over at the other man for a moment, completely unmoving. It takes him a moment to register what in the world Arthur is talking about; after all, it's been a minute or two since he spoke, and pet names aren't exactly an abnormal thing to come out of Eames' mouth. But he supposes... "love" is a bit more uncommon. For Arthur it's usually pet or dear, darling on those occasions that he thinks he can get away with it. Love isn't unheard of, but... but it isn't common.

 

Eames doesn't know why he'd said that just now instead of any of the other, more common, endearments. Aside from the fact that he seems to love referring to Arthur in pet-name form, both because the glares he gets are thrilling and because he can get away with it and he doubts most anyone else could. There was no deeper reason for that, really, or at least, he didn't think about it before he'd said it. It just happened, and now he doesn't know what to say.

 

 _Is_ Arthur his love? The entire concept is a little more than slightly frightening to Eames, who generally fulfills the definition of "lone wolf" if ever there was one. But what if he is? What if that's the reason that when Arthur appeared, unannounced, Eames let him in and didn't disappear overnight, change his name and just be gone? Eames doesn't know and he doesn't particularly like thinking about it, not like this. And Arthur is drunk, which makes now not the time to be panicking over it. He couldn't tell Arthur the truth if he tried, because Eames hasn't the slightest what the truth is, and that should bother him but never really has. Could that be what this is, love? Should he be allowed to love Arthur at all? Eames isn't sure that even exists. You can't fake it. And if you can't fake it, he's not sure he can feel it.

 

"And what if you were?" he asks quietly, and it sounds like a light question, but he's not sure it is. But Arthur is half asleep, anyway, and Eames isn't convinced he'll remember much of this. If he'd been coherent, he doesn't think Arthur would have said that. He'd have muttered something about not being his love or his pet or his anything, as per usual, and Eames would have disregarded it completely, also as per usual. "What would you do about it?"

 

 But Arthur is still not quite asleep, and after a moment, one eye opens to stare blearily at Eames for a few seconds before closing again. Speech takes another minute or two; his mind is not working at anywhere near its normal speed. But he does answer, because even quite trashed he realizes that this is important, what they're discussing. His brain places it in the 'very important things' category almost immediately; it just takes him a couple of minutes to catch up to that and formulate a response to what he suspects might be a trick question.

 

 "I don't know," he says finally, being completely honest about it. "'Ve never been anyone's love."

 

 For a long time, that had been a conscious choice, to avoid relationships- after a while, however, it had simply been... habit. He didn't have time, or the energy, or even the desire to find a companion, especially when touching someone had always been an issue. He had Cobb, a strong friendship and business relationship, and his work, and the occasional meeting with someone in a bar, and that had been enough for him. Now... hell, he doesn't know, and his brain is really not up to the task of delving into his own feelings. Especially about Eames. Those are a lot more complicated than most.

 

That comment strikes Eames as a horrible shame, suddenly and quite against his will. He withholds a frown, but his brow furrows anyway, and the forger falls silent. For once, he is feeling much too sober for this conversation. Not a problem he generally has, but then, he doesn't normally have a drunken Arthur, either. A drunken Arthur who, Eames prays, won't remember this tomorrow. This is a little much for him to have to handle again without at least one of them being drunk or otherwise impaired.

 

"Fair enough," he admits quietly, and wonders what he's supposed to say. And why Arthur has never been anyone's love. He's never been, either. Maybe it's not uncommon. Well, if it's not a real thing, like Eames suspects, then it wouldn't be uncommon, would it?

 

Either way, he is much too confused and Arthur is much too drunk for this to carry on, so Eames leans in to kiss Arthur before the other man can react, more a brush of lips than anything else. "Go to sleep, Arthur." Arthur is too drunk for this, and he is too sober. Maybe next time he'll be drunk enough to answer.

 

The point man does as ordered, mumbling something incomprehensible but also making a quiet, pleased sort of noise when he's kissed. His eyes are closed, so it's sort of a surprise, a nice surprise...

 

He wakes the next morning, as always, completely lacking a hangover... and with a few gaps regarding what exactly had happened the night before. He remembers the important parts, he thinks... there had been sex. Multiple times, if he's not mistaken. There had also been M&Ms, and cartoons, and... superman? That one he's not too sure of.

 

What he does recall, standing in the bathroom and eyeing his reflection, contemplating shaving, is a conversation they'd had just before he'd passed out. How he'd asked the forger...

 

He has the sudden urge to beat his head against the wall.

 

Pet names. They don't mean anything. It was just a variation on the 'pet, darling, Arthur dear' theme, and he'd just had to say something, damn his lack of a filter when intoxicated. He refrains from beating his head against the wall, yes, but more to avoid the subsequent headache than for any other reason, and by the time he exits the bathroom, still unshaven and beginning to feel sore in certain unmentionable areas (totally worth it), he's decided that Eames knows he was drunk. Therefore... he simply won't remember it, if the forger brings up the subject. On that note, he moves over to the coffee machine to start a pot, clad only in his pants.

 

From his spot sitting on the sofa, work spread out on the coffee table in front of him as it had been until late the night before, Eames watches Arthur move around, looking mildly incredulous.

 

He'd been up until late the night before, working, and this morning he'd woken early again, and carried on with what he'd been doing. He'd had plenty of rest the day before, after all, much more than necessary, and finds himself behind. He hadn't been able to stay asleep for very long. Arthur, on the other hand, had slept like a rock, a very sexy rock, but a rock nonetheless. And he'd been drunken the night before, thoroughly... and this morning he looks downright pleasant. The forger senses that the natural order of things has been defied, and does not appreciate it.

 

Eames narrows his eyes at the other man over top of the poker chip and tiny paintbrush he's holding in hand, copying small printed letters upside-down from a chip sitting on the table. "You look absurdly chipper."

 

"Thank you?" Arthur guesses, not sure if that's the correct response. The forger looks displeased, and he blinks, a bit confused. "What?"

 

Letting the pot fill, he rolls his shoulders and drops down to do his sit-ups at least, even if he can't do his push-ups. Hunting down a weight room to work on his left arm wouldn't be a bad idea, really... he finishes the sit-ups with his usual speed, keeping his right arm held out to the side so as not to put any strain on it, and then rolls back to his feet just as the coffee maker finishes and beeps.

 

"Not all of us hate mornings." Pouring a cup, he holds it out to Eames, brows raised.

 

Despite the fact that he is still watching Arthur incredulously, Eames takes the offered coffee, putting the chip he'd been working on down next to the original and the couple rows of finished pieces he's letting dry, along with the raw materials the tech guy had finished. The damn things need tiny computer chips inside of them. Seems ridiculous to Eames, but that would be why he isn't the tech guy. He's the guy making them look realistic. Which takes forever, even sans spelling errors. Well. As far as Eames has seen. He checks them but tends to quit caring after a while. He'll have to re-check again later, as this is a bit more important than the half-cons he runs in shady joints in Mombasa.

 

"It has nothing to do with mornings," he says, but only after he's had some coffee. He's been up for hours, but he won't turn down coffee. After that, he sets it carefully down away from his work and picks the chip back up, resuming his careful work with the sort of intense concentration he rarely displays in conversations or non-work-related activities. He still finds concentration enough to complain, though. "It has more to do with your apparent lack of hangover. It's simply unnatural." While it's true that that much vodka also wouldn't have given Eames a hangover, he's worked at it. He still has hangovers when he gets thoroughly smashed. Arthur knows. He's seen that firsthand.

 

Amused, Arthur sips at his own coffee, leaning back against the dresser. "I've never had a hangover," he admits, well aware that he'll be killed for that. It had never seemed very right for him to mention it, having watched Eames suffer through them, but he doesn't really have a choice just now. Oh, well. He'd find out eventually; it doesn't occur to the point man, just then, to wonder at how his brain had automatically assumed he would be, er, associating with the forger (for lack of a better word) for a long period of time.

 

Eames is glowering, and he stifles a smile, although his eyes are amused above the coffee mug as he takes another sip. "Sorry."

 

Eames' glower worsens at the amusement in the other man's expression. Never had a hangover. He has _never_ had a _hangover_. No matter how many times Eames repeats that sentence in his head with the emphasis on different words, it's still the most horrifically unfair thing he has ever heard, and seems to cause slightly homicidal feelings. Arthur is very lucky that he is in the middle of working or he'd probably start throwing things at him. Such as the sofa.

 

"You're a bastard," he says with a glower. He is well aware that this couldn't possibly be Arthur's fault, but that hardly matters. He's amused by it, and he most definitely is not sorry. Disgruntled, Eames returns to his work with a scowl. Never had a hangover. It just isn't _right_.

 

"I've been called worse." Arthur takes another sip from his coffee, looking decidedly unbothered by the insult- on the sofa, Eames mutters something under his breath, and the point man eyes him. "What was that, Mr. Eames?"

 

He receives no response, and knowing better than to interrupt the other man while he's working (if he ever wants to work uninterrupted, himself, again), Arthur wanders over in the general direction of his coat. He pulls out his guns, then, and sets them out on the desk, sitting down and starting to take them apart, one by one, and clean them thoroughly. Usually this is a daily ritual, but he's been lax, and there's no excuse for that.

 

Arthur has long hands, with long fingers, more useful for a pianist than a soldier (and in fact, that had always been useful for him when he'd played), but his hands move rapidly, taking the guns into pieces and then oiling each part carefully, making sure there's no remaining sand within either firearm. He takes his time, not being in any particular hurry, and when he's finished both weapons are gleaming. But he leaves them sitting on the desk, staring at them for a little while before he appears to come back to himself. "When's your job finished?"

 

"Wednesday," Eames says without glancing up. A moment passes, and then Eames puts the chip he'd just finished down, along with the paintbrush. He has some ink on him, but that's not abnormal, and he doesn't seem to notice as he looks over at Arthur, who appears to have cleaned his guns without Eames having noticed in the slightest. The fact that Arthur can move around handling weapons and Eames is comfortable enough to hyper-concentrate on his work while he does so is a bit frightening to Eames, but he brushes that aside.

 

He eyes the back of Arthur's head for a moment before elaborating. "Tuesday night, Wednesday morning. As soon as I've finished playing I'm out of the country, someone else handles the laundering and the fallout." The 'why do you ask' remains unspoken.

 

 

Arthur nods, mind working even though his eyes are still on his guns. "Okay." He pauses, glances back at Eames. "Just wondering when I have to plan on leaving."

 

The idea is not one he particularly wants to think about, truth be told. It might be a little pathetic, but it feels... safe, being here with Eames. But a job is a job, and in a couple of days his peace will be over. Again. He does need to get back to New York, he supposes, or London, but it's been a month and he's in no rush. Hell, he doesn't even have a cell phone, and his laptop had been... er... eliminated, two weeks before.

 

Eliminated via an explosion. He's still pretty pissed about that, actually. But it does mean that he has to get back to one of those two cities in order to check for potential job offers, because he has no inclination towards using any sort of public computer or traceable phone. Voicemail might be an option, if he could find a disposable cell...

 

Regardless, no more warzones. That is his decision. Whatever job he takes on next, he'd prefer it to just be research, or at the very least, for it not to involve any AK-47s.

 

"That Tuesday night before I leave for the casino would be best," Eames says after a moment. "In case they catch on." In which case they would undoubtedly find this place within the hour. He doesn't say it, but Eames thoroughly hates the idea of his job getting Arthur caught. It would be different were Arthur working on this _with_ him, but he's not. To this job, he is an innocent bystander. Certainly no civilian and not really innocent in any sense of the word besides that, but innocent of _this_ particular crime. If Arthur were to be caught, Eames would prefer it be on his own merit. Or, well, his own fault, in that cause.

 

Although he'd much prefer neither of them be caught. But that goes without saying.

 

He eyes Arthur again. "Where to then?" he asks, not sure Arthur actually knows himself. Judging by this conversation, he's probably not got a plan worked out just yet. And even if he has, telling Eames is not necessarily in the plan.

 

Arthur glances back over his shoulder at Eames, his eyes meeting the forger's. "Back to New York or London, I guess," he responds after a minute. "The rest of my research work is there. It was all... well, it went with my laptop."

 

Vaporized with his netbook, as it happens. He's still mourning the loss.

 

Though he’d been trying to squash the tiniest bit of displeasure that Arthur might end up going to London, where he can’t follow, Eames forgets all about that when Arthur says his research ‘went with the laptop.’ A statement like that, naturally, can’t go without a little curiosity, despite the fact that Eames isn’t sure he wants to know. No, scratch that- Eames absolutely doesn’t want to know. But he can’t help but wonder. Character flaw. Everyone ought to have one.

 

Plus, Eames knows how important Arthur’s laptop is to him. He might not quite understand why, but he knows it. He does his work on that thing. He’d probably marry it if he could. “That’s, ah…” he pauses, not wanting to invite conversation if Arthur isn’t wanting to, but wanting to allow elaboration all the same in case he does. “…I’m sorry to hear that.”

 

Arthur makes a "mmmph" sort of noise before finally picking up the guns and setting them on the nightstand on what he's decided is his side of the bed, and moving over to sit on the couch next to Eames, eyeing what he's doing with no little interest. He doesn't sit close enough that he's invading the other man's space, since he knows how much he, Arthur, hates that when he's working, but he's clearly watching.

 

"There was a missile," he says absently a moment later, inspecting the chips that are already finished. They look remarkably real. He wouldn't be able to tell the difference. Of course, he's not a forger, but still. "Long month. My spam folder is probably overloaded."


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Arthur takes a job outside dreamshare as a favor for a friend, and follows Eames to Kiev when it's finished, a bit worse for wear.

It takes every ounce of willpower in him for Eames to keep from announcing, _A missile?!_ probably more loudly than strictly necessary. He manages, _barely_ , but can’t keep from staring at Arthur for a moment as though he’s not entirely certain he’s awake. After all, in a dream, announcing ‘there was a missile’ as though this were just another fact of life might be construed as normal. Unfortunately, however, this is the real world, and that is decidedly lacking in normality.

It’s several moments of stunned silence before Eames manages to gather himself. He refuses to believe that even Arthur could be so blasé about a bloody _missile_ apparently taking out his laptop (What. The. Fuck?), but the point man doesn’t offer any more information, and Eames is officially both horrendously curious and far, far too frightened to ask.

So, gathering his wits, as they seem to have been scattered a bit, Eames blinks for the first time in perhaps a minute and turns back to the next poker chip. Soon-to-be poker chip. Even then it takes several tries for words to come out of his mouth, because he doesn’t want to sound like someone just punched him in the face when he speaks. “Undoubtedly,” he agrees.

 

"I wasn't in the car at the time," Arthur says after a minute, since it would have taken a blind man to miss the forger's shock. And he feels a bit bad, regrets mentioning it... he hadn't meant to freak Eames out. Honestly. And he'd been a lot more freaked out, himself, when it had happened. And really, freaked out about nearly being vaporized more than losing his netbook, if he's honest. He's only human. "I was running away from it as fast as I could go." Him and everyone else who'd seen the man lifting the missile launcher.

Eames still has not resumed his painting, and Arthur growls a little, frustrated with himself for even bringing this up and distracting the other man. He's working. So much for the sanctity of that. "Look, it was three weeks ago. It wasn't exactly something that happens every day, but I've had time to get over it, and I'm not vaporized, so that's something." He looks down at his hands, finally doing what he's been trying not to do for the past day or so and thinking about what they'd done, for the past few weeks.

"At the time I was more worried about not getting shot, after they took out the car. There wasn't time to be freaked out." And he knows Eames understands that, because the same thing happens in dreams, and he's seen the forger do exactly the same thing. You get the job done, and freak out later.

 

Eames certainly _does_ understand that, he really does, but that doesn’t make hearing about Arthur nearly being done in via missile any less shocking to hear. By this point Eames has actually stopped looking down at the poker chip and is watching Arthur straight on, a decidedly uncommon occurrence during conversation with the forger. But in this case, well… his attention is very much on Arthur at the moment.

He was nearly vaporized when someone shot a missile at the car he was in three weeks ago. Good Christ, what has he been _doing_ for the past month? Each and every bit of information Arthur gives up about this past month is worse than the last. No wonder he’s a wreck.

He’s had time to get over it. Good. Christ. Arthur might have been a bit busy at the time, but Eames has a bit of time to be “freaked out” right now, himself. “As I haven’t the slightest how to respond to that information, let me just say, Arthur, that I am very glad you haven’t been vaporized.”

 

Arthur chuckles quietly, still staring down at his hands. "So am I," he says quietly. More or less glad. He's not sure where that feeling comes from, survivor's guilt, maybe, even though most of Chris' team had survived. They'd only lost one man, which considering... well. The odds weren't great, but they were all well-trained. That counts for a lot.

"It was a pretty straightforward job, going in," he says finally, not looking up. "[name redacted] hired us to take out his second-in-command, thought the guy was making a bid for _his_ job. Turns out he was just covering for [name redacted], and [name redacted] wanted him out of the way before he could make good on a threat to contact the UN. We didn't find that out until later, after we took him out. Chris' tech found records on the colonel's computer. He was shit at covering his tracks, which was probably how [name redacted] found out."

His hands are shaking very minutely, now, and he stares down at them. "We found what he'd covered for the general, and... pictures of other times he'd done it... and we talked it over and decided to stay. And we took down [name redacted]. On the news, that was us, if you hadn't figured that out." They'd taken out a sitting warlord, which had been more complicated than they'd originally expected, but after a month they'd done it. And if he thinks about it that way, in very clinical terms, he won't think about the reasons behind their decision, and he won't puke up the coffee he'd just started.

 

Sensing that he doesn’t want to know what the general had done (more than once) that had neede to be covered up, and that that is the real cause of Arthur’s showing up the way he had, a mess, barely himself, Eames doesn’t dare press. That had been a very bland summary, very high-level, and more, he suspects, than Arthur had wanted to discuss in the first place. And although killing off the general and fleeing from missiles is certainly frightening as shit, it’s not a recipe for this sort of reaction. That hadn’t been what had Arthur waking up in a sweat and losing dinner he hadn’t had.

Even so, Eames doesn’t really know what to say to that. He’d already expressed his gratitude to the universe that Arthur had survived. It’s uncomfortable to wonder about Arthur going off for a job and never coming back, because Eames would never know. Arthur would just be gone. It’s… unsettling, and it leaves a bad taste in Eames’ mouth, so he lets it go for now. That is the sort of thing that you just can’t think about, not in the world they live in.

“I had a hunch,” Eames admits quietly, almost dryly, after a minute of pretending not to see Arthur’s hands shake. He sits in silence for another minute after that, having no idea what he could possibly say to that. He isn’t going to push. He isn’t going to do anything but… well, what he’s been doing. Be there and listen if Arthur wants to tell him. Or distract him if Arthur needs distracting, which Eames thinks he very well might. So after a moment, the forger reaches over to the table, pushing a stack of the forged chips in Arthur’s direction and using the movement to shift closer to him on the couch. “Check my spelling for me.”

 

The point man doesn't miss his moving closer, but he doesn't call him on it or argue, picking up one of the chips and examining it closely. _Salut International Casino._ It looks pretty damn flawless, actually, and he's impressed, just as he had been while watching Eames paint them. He's also startled to be asked, but again, he doesn't question it.

He does send Eames a sidelong glance, well aware that he's being distracted. But there are no complaints from his end.

"Looks just like the real ones to me," he says simply, setting the chip down and moving through others in the stack. When he gets to the end, he smiles very slightly. "A-plus."

 

Eames’ eyebrows go up just a bit. “High praise,” he says, and he’s not being an arse. Arthur is by all standards a perfectionist.

Despite the fact that he would never, _ever_ normally ask _anyone_ for something like that, after having done so he can be pragmatic enough to recognize that he just saved himself an arse-ton of trouble looking each of those over and fighting to check their accuracy. The upside-down efforts, then, were not wasted. And he won’t have to worry about that being the thing that cocks everything up, which he undoubtedly would have. Even so, it’s hard to ignore the fact that being relieved that he hadn’t found anything wrong is strong enough that it turns to straight into annoyance. What a bloody stupid thing to be relieved about.

Still, the annoyance isn’t with Arthur, rather the opposite, and Eames has practice ignoring that as well. “Halfway finished,” he says after a moment. “It goes quickly. And this isn’t even the fun bit.”

 

Arthur looks amused, which is a feat considering what his mind has been stuck on. "The fun bit being the gambling, of course," he says, rolling his eyes slightly. "How much are you starting with?"

Even as he asks, he does the calculations, adding up the amount of the finished chips and then raising his brows. "A quarter of a million. Impressive." The intended end result must be even more impressive.

 

Eames’ grin is both pleased and vaguely smug. “That’s nothing to what we’ll come out with,” he says, agreeing wholeheartedly with what Arthur had been thinking. A quarter million is nothing to that place. And notably, Eames doesn’t say what they “should” come out with. It’s a foregone conclusion. Either they make out like bandits (in a very… literal sense) or they don’t make out at all. That’s how it is in Eames’ world.

And as for gambling... “Of course that’s the fun bit,” he says, because that’s a silly thing to have to clarify. “They have some real professionals in there.” It’ll be a challenge. Eames loves nothing more.

 

"I have every confidence in you," Arthur says drily. It's not sarcasm, though, even if he is teasing the other man. He has every confidence that Eames will come out of that casino a millionaire several times over. He wonders what the take for a job like that would be, but decides that he's not sure he wants to know.

And it doesn't really matter, in truth. It's not the sort of job Arthur could ever pull off. The forger, on the other hand, will like nothing better, he's sure. "You'll be in your element." And whether that's a compliment or an insult, he leaves up to Eames to determine, although his eyes are smiling.

 

Although there are _several_ ways in which that statement could be interpreted, there really is only one way for Eames to take it. Suggesting that his element is at a poker table, a game of cunning and misdirection more than wits, isn’t far off the mark. Actually it pretty much hits the mark spot-on, and they both know it.

“Why thank you, Arthur darling,” he says so sweetly he might have just given himself a cavity. He knows very well that Arthur is harassing him. It’s just that in this case he makes it very difficult. “You’ll be pleased, I fully intend to wear a suit. Boring, black and everything.”

 

There is a pause, during which Arthur is clearly debating taking umbrage with that statement. Finally, though, he settles for elbowing the forger gently, brow furrowed only slightly. "Enjoy that. I generally prefer a bit of color, but if you allow yourself that leeway they won't let you in the door."

His gaze ticks downward to Eames' sweater very pointedly. He's already insulted it once, yes, but he can hardly let the matter go with just that. It looks like someone took a clown's wig, pulled all the fibers out, and wove a sweater from them.

 

“The sweater again,” Eames says with a sigh. It’s put on, but there’s no way to prove that. Arthur always thinks everything Eames wears is ridiculous, and the more Arthur harasses him, the more Eames tends to wear the things Arthur is harassing him about. The sweater will definitely be leaving with him when he gets out of Kiev. And somehow that thought doesn’t cause Eames to wonder why he assumes he’ll be seeing Arthur again when he leaves Kiev.

He does spend a moment looking down at the sweater, though. “I don’t care what you say, I am fond of it. And they would let me in. Don’t doubt that for a second, pet.” There isn’t a place Eames couldn’t get himself into with some effort, no matter what he was dressed like. But that’s just the thing; no matter how he dresses normally, Eames _knows_ how to dress for a job. Which somehow seems to offend Arthur further, since that means he _chooses_ his clothing, and isn’t just lacking in style completely.

 

It's painful (often literally), it's true, but Arthur finally just shakes his head. He will never admit that as ridiculous as Eames often looks, it's somehow still attractive in the strangest, truly puzzling way. Even, though he would never admit it, not even on pain of death (he's pretty sure that trying to force the words past his lips would be physically impossible), that ridiculous sweater, when it's fit snugly over Eames' shoulders.

"I don't," he mutters, and then shuts his mouth, much as he'd like to demand the forger take the damned thing off. That would lead to things that Eames shouldn't be focusing on at the moment. He's working, and Arthur supposes he needs something to occupy himself, too. So after a pause, he stands, reaching for a tee shirt and not really caring whose it is as he tugs it over his head. "I might go use the gym while you work."

 

Sad to see Arthur putting on a shirt, Eames nevertheless is resigned to it having to happen eventually. Much as he might like the other man to walk around shirtless (or completely naked) all the time, there are other people in the world who might not appreciate the constant nudity. Not that Eames would particularly appreciate the rest of the world seeing Arthur naked—wait, hold on. Who Arthur is naked in front of is very much not his business.

Startled by the rather uncommonly jealous direction of his thoughts, Eames blinks and then shoves the thoughts aside, glancing up at Arthur, now with a shirt on. “It’s in the basement,” he says, having been there several times himself. His routine is not even remotely similar to Arthur’s, nor is it as perfectly constant, but it is about as constant as such things can be in the forger’s life to find him in the weight room of whatever hotel or motel he’s currently in. “Be careful of the treadmill. I watched it attempt murder on a girl last week. Poor thing.”

 

Nodding, Arthur grabs his watch and his wallet and coat (even just to go down to the basement), pressing his lips together in something of a smile. "Be back later, then."

About an hour and a half later, he returns with two white takeout bags, having finally gotten hungry once he'd run for a while. He'd lifted, too, working his good arm, and all in all he feels a lot better about everything. Physical activity has a tendency to do that for him, and he'd even gotten Eames another bag of M&Ms to go with dinner. And another bottle of vodka, to replace the one he'd finished the night before.

He makes a point to make noise in the hall before knocking, not wanting to startle the other man and screw up his work. But he'd forgotten to take a key, and he's got food.

 

Having heard him coming, Eames stands, stretching, and wanders over to the door; he’d already started putting the forged chips away. He’s not finished, but near enough that it’s certainly time for a break, considering how long he’s been at it. If he doesn’t take breaks, the quality suffers. He pauses at the door to doublecheck that it’s actually Arthur, despite the fact that he knows it is; paranoia is the reason he hasn’t been murdered in his sleep many times over, after all. Or not in his sleep. He could be murdered while perfectly awake.

But he isn’t about to be murdered; as he’d thought, it’s Arthur, so Eames unlocks the door, stepping aside to let him in and then raising his eyebrows at the bags. Food? Suddenly Eames realizes he’s starving, but more importantly, does this mean _Arthur_ is hungry?

“Funny, I didn’t notice a takeout place in the basement,” he says, but he flashes the other man an appreciative smile as he says it. And maybe a bit relieved, too. Hungry is a good sign.

 

"And yet there is one down the street." Arthur carries the takeout bag in and reaches inside, rooting around until he pulls out the candy bag and chucks it at Eames' chest. "Since you finished the others. But you have to eat something else, too."

He pulls out a Coke for each of them, having decided that one, Eames probably won't drink while he's working and two, a repeat of his lack of a hangover might get him punched. With this in mind, he carries the bottles to the coffee table and stretches out with his feet up on it, bag of sandwiches dropped unceremoniously where the poker chips had been before he'd left.

 

“Yes, mum,” Eames says, catching the bag automatically and then looking down at it for a moment. The retort has absolutely no sting to it, though, because he’s busy being strangely touched by the fact that Arthur had just… picked up more M&Ms because he’d eaten all of the ones he’d had. He hadn’t asked the other man to do that, hadn’t said a word about it. Going out to get food is pretty normal, but… he doesn’t know. It’s just nice. Not something people normally just… do. At least not for him.

Then again, he supposes he doesn’t normally hang about people long enough for things like that to occur. It’s not as though people aren’t nice to him. He’s being stupid. So, following Arthur’s example, he sits down as well, gracefully falling onto the sofa and stretching a bit. He’s been cramped over poker chips for hours. “Thank you.”

 

It's becoming clear that Arthur doesn't accept thanks very well, because he looks briefly hesitant, although this is covered quickly by a nod and a hunt for the package of food he'd intended for himself. He never knows how to respond to gratitude, for bigger or smaller things, and he hadn't... well. He'd just thought that Eames would like the candy, and maybe he'd wanted the forger to smile a bit. He has a very attractive smile, and Arthur will admit that easily... although perhaps not aloud. No need to inflate the man's swollen ego any further.

It's... nice, he realizes a little while later, just sitting and eating on the couch with Eames. Very nice, actually. It's such a normal, everyday thing to do that it strikes him as strangely notable, as much sense as that makes. He's quiet throughout the meal, just enjoying it and, not that he'd admit it aloud, the company.

Well, maybe he'd admit it aloud. "Thank you for just... taking me in," he counters, a good few minutes too late. It's all right, though. They were both a bit mesmerized by the Russian version of CSI.

 

Normally gratitude isn’t as much of a problem for Eames, but then, normally he _wouldn’t_ just take someone in, not like this. Maybe a child dying out in the snow or someone whose car broke down, an old lady whose hip was broken, you know, those sorts of things. But not someone he knows, someone who’d just… shown up. But then again, how does he really know? People don’t normally just show up, do they? How could they? He’s never in one place long enough to worry about that sort of thing, not really.

But Arthur had, and Eames hadn’t even considered what he should do. He’d just let the man in. Later, he’d wondered… he’ll wonder more, he’s sure. But he’d done it. And now here they are, and Eames doesn’t really know what to say to that. Normally, he’d go for a quip about the mindblowing sex or the fact that Arthur had just fed him. But considering what Arthur had been running from… Eames finds that he just can’t. “Of course,” he says instead, not meeting the other man’s eyes. He wasn’t lying when he’d said he’s glad Arthur had found him, but the subject is a complicated one.

 

Arthur nods, looking at Eames for an extra beat or two before returning his eyes to the television. After a minute, though, he shifts a bit closer on the couch, not bothering to be subtle about it. They're very near to touching by the time he determines he's close enough, and although he waits a minute to be sure he won't be rejected (he knows it's not likely, but... well. He has to be sure), he lifts an arm and rests it first on the couch behind Eames... and then over the forger's shoulders.

He's not tense, but he's not precisely relaxed, either; he's more just... waiting. For the other man to move away or stay where he is, or to lean against him, he supposes. Not that he thinks Eames is going to pull away, but... well. This is his first attempt. He's allowed to be a bit nervous.

 

Eames, on the other hand, _does_ tense a little, eyes widening just slightly; he's still surprised, despite the fact that he had witnessed this all happening very slowly. There really was no mistaking what he was doing, after all, but it's still surprising to Eames. He doesn't know if it's surprising because he knows how Arthur is with casual touching, and this is certainly more casual than usual, or if it's the fact that it's... he doesn't know. So _familiar_ , in a different sort of way. God knows the forger is used to casually touching people; he does it all the time, to people he knows, people he's just met, people he hasn't met but needs their wallet... the point is, he's used to touching people. But for some reason, this isn't like that. Eames doesn't really know why.

Maybe it's just that it's Arthur. No, scratch that, it is _definitely_ something to do with the fact that it's Arthur. And this isn't normal, casual touching between two people, nor is it the sort of touching that comes lying in bed or after a good shag, or even as it'd been the night Arthur had shown up, when Eames was clearly trying to comfort him. This is different, somehow, and _that_ is what is getting him, not the contact at all. The _meaning_ behind it, because he knows Arthur, knows that it takes effort for him.

The forger won't lie about it, he seriously considers, for a moment, fleeing in one way or another. Possibly to Mexico.

But after a moment of barely concealed wide-eyed emotion- either panic or confusion, maybe both, as though he doesn't quite understand what had just happened or why the idea is frightening the hell out of him, because that's just... ridiculous- Eames notices, too, that Arthur is tense, like he's waiting for Eames to pull away, and that-- well, despite the fact that he _was_ just thinking about doing that, Eames finds that Arthur worrying he's going to be scampering off is not something he cares for. Go figure that out, he certainly can't, and doesn't try. Instead, he forces himself to calm down, and realizes that he's being an idiot, and this isn't so bad at all. The physical contact certainly isn't a problem. It's nice, actually, and after a moment, the tension starts to leave the forger, little by little, as he leans just a little over into Arthur, possibly with the vague intention of working himself up to laying his head on the other man's shoulder.

 

After a moment of watching the forger out of the corner of his eye, Arthur relaxes a bit, too, not that he'd been _tense_ , really, just... cautious. And he doesn't think he can be blamed, because Eames, uncharacteristically, had been quite... well, also tense, there for a couple of minutes. And it had made Arthur think that perhaps he's overstepped a boundary, maybe this is too much. Maybe it's that it's not quite... well, manly, he guesses, to have your arm around another man's shoulders like this, and it's true that they've always sort of avoided a lot of affection for that reason, or so at least it's always seemed to him.

Or maybe... hell, he doesn't know, but there's an uncomfortable feeling in his gut as he recalls their conversation of the night before, just before he'd passed out, and he fights back the urge to flee, himself. That would be ridiculous, and rather cowardly. He's being stupid. Eames is relaxed, now, had leaned against him, too, and he can stop over-thinking it all. The other man is allowed a minute of unsureness, of uncomfortableness, it isn't as though Arthur can't understand _that._

So he stays where he is, and tries to just keep his attention on the television. It doesn't really work, though, because every molecule of his body appears to be attuned to the forger, and it's not easy to keep his attention on anything else.

 

It seems almost impossible for Eames to keep his attention on the television, as well, although he's certainly giving it a good shot. His eyes are trained on it, but then again, that means just about nothing in terms of his attention. Not surprisingly, that is very focused on Arthur. And trying to figure out what the hell is going on. And maybe what is wrong with him. Himself, not Arthur. There's nothing wrong with Arthur. Well, besides the usual (can't keep it to himself even in his head, but he doesn't mean it, really, which he can admit in his head). And also what had happened recently. There is that. But he means in terms of... this.

Whatever "this" is. Eames decides, after a few minutes, that focusing on this is going to drive him insane, and finally manages to stop trying to figure out what the hell is wrong with him. It's stupid, it doesn't matter, and that's enough of that, Eames.

CSI in Russian it is, then. Eames drops his worry with alarming ease. "I believe I saw this exact plot once in the American CSI."

 

"You may be right," Arthur agrees after a minute, staring at the head of the CSI team. "But which one?" There are certainly enough of them. He personally has a love-hate relationship with the one with the sunglasses. He has no idea which one that is... wait, no, he does. Miami. "I prefer the Miami one, if the procedurals are all that's on. The shitty one-liners are the best."

They lounge there quietly for a few minutes, before Arthur abruptly picks up their conversation from earlier. "You never said where you're going after Tuesday night." He keeps his eyes on the television, on the ridiculously repetitive plot, and tries not to seem too invested in Eames' answer.

 

Eames is silent for a moment, as he almost always is when a direct question regarding something like that is asked. It's impossible for him _not_ to pause and think about it for a moment, or at least Eames thinks so. He's never been able to give that sort of information out without serious inner debate. Even to Arthur, who somehow has gotten more out of him than most people. But most of the information Arthur has he's gotten not from direct questions but from offhanded comments Eames makes without realizing. Which is still much different from the way he normally guards such comments, but that makes no difference here.

There's no reason _not_ to tell Arthur where he's planning on going. He could find out in two minutes, for Christ's sake. And besides, he'd already told Arthur details about the job he's working that are much more sensitive than this. Why should it be so hard to answer a simple question? It shouldn't. But it is.

"Quebec," he says after a pause, pretending it didn't just take him several seconds to force the answer out. "Not the standard retreat, but they're likely to be all over my arse following this. I'll be quite visible for a few hours. Ought to lie low for a bit before heading back to anywhere I'm known." But Eames is quite, quite good at disappearing when the need arises. The trick is not to be who they're looking for.

 

Arthur isn't sure what to make of the pause, aside from the fact that Eames had clearly had to consider whether or not to tell him. Which makes... little sense, to him. He'd had no trouble telling Eames where he's likely headed, and the forger is the one who'd said Arthur could show up at any time.

Perhaps he hadn't meant it, not really. Not that he would deliberately _not_ want the point man to show up, maybe, but Arthur is aware that it's a big thing, to give someone a blanket answer about something like that. It's normal to be nervous about giving away a future location, compromising security that way, especially when the place in question is a place to lie low.

So really, logically, that pause shouldn't bother him. What had he thought, anyway? Where had his mind been? Considering the relatively short distance between Montreal and New York? Relatively short when compared to the trip he just made, at least... but that's ridiculous. They're not business partners, they're not... he has no idea what they are. But whatever this thing between them is, it isn't the sort of thing where it's all right to consider following someone halfway around the world.

Again.

No, it's not that kind of thing. Maybe it could be for Arthur, but even if Eames wanted it to be, and Arthur has no idea if he would, it wouldn't be safe. Would it? He has no idea. About any of it. And thinking about it all is hurting his brain.

"Can't get much safer than Canada," is his quiet response, as the credits start to roll on the episode. "I'm going to go shower." After the gym, he doesn't exactly smell fresh, and he feels the sudden need to get up and move, distract himself from his thoughts. And after a brief pause, he retrieves his arm and stands, rubbing the back of his head as he heads in the direction of the bathroom.

 

“All right,” Eames says, equally quiet, but Arthur’s already up and gone by that point, arm no longer around or anywhere near the forger.

Eames spends a few moments staring at the television and trying to ignore the sudden absence of Arthur’s warmth and wondering what, exactly, he’s doing here. Not here Kiev, not the job, but… with Arthur, he supposes. What… is he doing? Eames has no idea, but it’s already so far beyond what he normally does, has already broken so many of his personal rules, and now suddenly it hits a point where Eames hadn’t planned for and didn’t see coming and he’s panicking.

The shower starts in the bathroom, and Eames lets his head fall back onto the back of the sofa with a sigh, running a hand through his hair. How can he feel like he’s mucked something up when he doesn’t even know what’s going on?

 

Arthur stays in the shower for a long time, washing off and then just letting the hot water run over his head and shoulders, bracing his hands against the tiled wall and lowering his head. His arm aches, stings with the hot water running over it, but he ignores it, closing his eyes and wondering what the hell he's doing.

It feels like he's stripped a layer off, the one he puts on with his suits and his hair and... just fucking everything he does, controlling it all. Actually, he didn't do the stripping; Eames peeled all of that away, and now he can touch him and be touched and not feel like he has to have every second of the day planned out, and it feels _good_... Hell, he hasn't even shaved off the beard. He feels like a different person. One who went through hell for a month, yeah, but a fuckload different from the Arthur of a few months before. And he's dreading going back to that Arthur, even though he knows somehow that this can't last. He has to go back and do his job.

But he has this horrible suspicion that his feelings have taken this thing with Eames way farther than could possibly be healthy for his psyche. It would be completely stupid to fall in love with Eames. Really, very, extremely stupid. It's sex, and friendship too, probably, but it's not more than that.

It's the adrenaline. Spending a month in and out of an adrenaline rush had done this to him. And maybe... maybe gave him a taste for cutting loose a little. He remembers the rush of taking on another man and coming out on top, the rush he'd satisfied in dreams since he'd gotten into extraction. Going back to that hadn't been the greatest idea, he figures. It's just... because of that. He'd run here because Eames wouldn't ask questions or try to make him talk anything out, knows what it means to take a job that involves getting blood on your hands, and getting it done.

He remembers the face of everyone he's killed in real life. Not all of the projections, but all the living, breathing people. He can recall them all. There's been blood on his hands for a decade. Nobody wants to deal with issues like that when they've got their own problems, right? He shouldn't throw that shit on someone else. He can take the sex, the companionship, appreciate it, enjoy it while it lasts, and then walk away until the next time they cross paths. He did it before, after Florence. This feels different, but... it doesn't matter. It isn't, actually.

By the time he shuts off the water, he's calmed down. That's probably what he needed. Just to think things through. Eames is right on the other side of that wall, he knows that, but he doesn't leave yet. He just pulls the sweats back on, not bothering with socks or a shirt, and pulls out the little canister of shaving cream and the razor supplied by the hotel; clearly Eames had been using his own. Not that Arthur had noticed a change in the stubble since he'd arrived.

His face feels strange when he finally walks out of the bathroom, rubbing at the smooth skin. His hair is slicked back, still soaked, and he looks much more like himself. Eames is staring at him, and after a pause, he shrugs. "It itched."

 

Still sitting in the same spot he’d been when Arthur had gone to shower, Eames stares up at him, saying nothing. He’d spent the entire time Arthur had been in the shower staring at the television, trying not to wonder at what had just happened- or maybe _not_ happened- and finding it more difficult than usual to turn his attention to something else.

As if that hadn’t been disconcerting enough, that along with the few moments before Arthur had gotten up, now here Arthur’s back, and… well. He’s back, and back to the Arthur Eames is used to seeing. The one Eames had been hoping to see again, worried as he was about the point man’s last job… but now he’s not so certain that was actually what he’d wanted at all.

It’s not his business, Eames reminds himself. Arthur can shave his beard all he wants. Not every little thing has some deep secret meaning. He’s going to drive himself mad if he keeps this up. And that would be very bad for business. “You haven’t done yourself any favors, considering the wind chill,” the forger finally decides on. Because for some reason, the typical sexual harassment response just isn’t coming.

 

Arthur shrugs, the movement accentuated by the moisture still on his skin as he pulls out another one of Eames' tee shirts out of the other man's suitcase. He's going to have to do a load of laundry the next day, since he keeps using up all of the forger's clothes. The muscles in his back ripple as he pulls on the shirt, but they're abruptly hidden by a shirt a good two sizes too baggy for him.

"Good thing I'll be mostly inside," he says over his shoulder, pulling on socks as well and then sitting back down on the sofa, grabbing for a couple of M&Ms before sitting back. He doesn't prop up his feet, crossing his legs instead, one ankle resting on his knee, and tries to figure out what's going on on the show. Eames doesn't argue with any of his candy being taken, but it would be pretty impossible to miss that Arthur hadn't sat precisely back where he'd been when he'd left to shower. There aren't inches between them, but he's definitely not right up against the forger now. "Do they have pay-per-view?"

 

Eames is feeling much less appreciative of watching Arthur dress than he typically is, and the forger allows himself a moment to feel the loss of a perfectly good moment to ogle a bit. He ogles everyone. Especially Arthur. If ogling Arthur were a sport, Eames would be a gold medal winner for certain. He could definitely outdo even Ariadne. Which is not a direction he really wants his brain to be going in right now. Good. Christ. Eames.

Very nearly smacking himself in the face to put an end to all of this, Eames snaps back to reality after a moment, decides not to notice the distance between them like an emotional little teenaged girl, and considers Arthur’s question.

“Yes,” he says after a moment, sounding very decidedly Eames-like when he adds, “and the porn selection is really subpar.”

 

The point man snorts, reaching over and attempting to snatch the remote from him. But Eames doesn't even fight him for it, and Arthur spends a brief second blinking at him before pointing it at the television. Is he sick? Eames, not fight him for taking something from him, just on principle?

"In English we have..." He raises a brow. "Braveheart or Goldeneye. What a selection." He doesn't go to the porn, figuring that he can take the forger's word that there's nothing good. And besides, he really doesn't have any urge to watch porn with Eames. It just seems... wrong, somehow.

 

Braveheart or Goldeneye. Eames can’t help but snort. Not that he minds James Bond. He certainly doesn’t; Bond is, after all, the best MI6 agent… ever. Despite being a fictional character. That doesn’t really matter to Eames or… anyone else in the world. And as for Braveheart, well. That does have a special place in any Englishman’s heart as “that movie where we look like a bunch of wankers.”

“That about matches the porn selection,” he says with a bit of a sigh. “I’d say go with Bond, if you tend to take Braveheart seriously.”

 

Arthur turns to eye him. "You don't generally take people being run through with claymores seriously?" he asks, arching a brow. He actually doesn't mind Braveheart. Nor does he mind Bond, obviously, although he prefers either Connery or Brosnan over the new guy, he has to say.

It's pure curiosity that has him clicking on Braveheart. Well, curiosity and a small desire to be a bit of a pain in the ass. But hey. What can he say? It's Eames, and he can't deny that he is very interested in Eames' ass in any sense.

 

Not surprised even slightly by this, Eames shakes his head slightly, just barely keeping from rolling his eyes. All right, well, he warned the man. It had been more for Arthur’s sake than his own, mainly because the other man tends to take things much more seriously than Eames ever does. And who knows if this is his favorite movie? Eames doesn’t know. Maybe he has a thing for blokes in kilts. Blue blokes in kilts.

Or claymores. “I don’t know. I don’t generally get to see blokes being run through with claymores, so it’s entirely possible I would not take it seriously.” Much as he won’t take any scene with Edward I seriously. Or with anyone, really. But mostly the British. He doesn’t really care one way or the other about the Scots.

 

Arthur rolls his eyes, settling back to watch the movie without comment. They make it about half an hour in before, in a serious* moment, there is what sounds suspiciously like a giggle from the other occupant of the couch. Arthur almost doesn't comment, but in the end he can't help but ask, a moment later, "Did you just... giggle?"

He eyes the screen, where they've just run someone through. With a spear, though, not a claymore, to be specific. "Er... this seems like less than a giggling moment."

 

“It was a snicker,” Eames clarifies, but doesn’t seem terribly bothered otherwise by the suggestion that he’d been giggling. Really, the clarification seems more like a token protest in an effort to preserve manliness. It was an expression of amusement, that’s really all that matters to him. Of course Arthur would comment.

As for whether or not this is not a giggle-worthy moment, Eames just has to disagree. Still amused, he picks out a red M&M and throws it into his mouth before shrugging. “I warned you, pet. It can only go downhill from here.”

And indeed it does. Nearly every time a British soldier is brutally murdered, Eames fights a wave of amusement. Nearly every time the King is onscreen, Eames at one point or another actually does laugh. And then every once in a while he just snickers a bit at Mel Gibson because the man is really quite ridiculous sometimes. All in all, it’s true: he just can’t take it seriously.

 

By the end, with the drawing and the quartering, Arthur is for the most part fed up. He chucks the last M&M from his latest handful at the forger and turns off the television. "You're ridiculous," he proclaims, turning sideways and leaning against the sofa arm so he can kick the other man lightly.

Ridiculous is not a strong enough word, but he's definitely smiling as he says it, so that's something.

 

Now Eames actually does break into laughter, not bothering to hide it despite the fact that he is now moving to protect himself from being kicked. The M&M had set him off, and no amount of kicking is going to shut him up now. Besides, he knows very well that Arthur isn’t actually kicking him, because if Arthur was actually going to hurt him, he’d be done for on the ground right about now, at best, he would never have seen it coming.

Strangely, that thought doesn’t worry the forger much; he is much too busy very nearly cackling. Arthur isn’t even glaring at him and it’s still funny. Of course, this hilarity might have something to do with the fact that the further along the movie got, the more annoyed Arthur got with Eames’ inappropriate laughter… the more Eames began to laugh at inappropriate moments. What can he say, it’s just how he is.

“I told you-“ he begins, trying to defend himself by shuffling away and holding his hands up, but it’s not really working as he is also laughing too hard to really concentrate and he isn’t actually trying to go anywhere. “-I said you shouldn’t- take it seriously but- but you had to-it’s your own fault!”

 

"Yeah, of course, blame me!" Arthur shoves at him, then, laughing himself. "It's my fault you're ridiculous! Blame me!" He kicks again, then, wheezing a bit. It's not as though the man wouldn't have found something to laugh at in Goldeneye, too!

There's a pause, and then he yelps as his ankle is grabbed and he's dragged forward. He thwacks Eames in the face with a pillow, then, hard. And then twice. His ankle is still trapped, but that doesn't prevent him from kicking the other man with his free foot and trying to lever him into a headlock. This fails, but that's mostly due to the fact that Arthur is laughing too hard to even try.

 

The laughter carries on until somehow Eames ends up falling on the floor, luckily missing the coffee table, where… he carries on laughing because he’d fallen. Really, by this point, it’s just turned into a fit of hilarity, and there’s little he can do but ride it out. This would be much easier if Arthur laughing didn’t also cause Eames’ laughter to be prolonged.

Several minutes later finds the forger lying on the floor, and somehow Arthur’s foot is on that side of the couch, leg half hanging off the couch over Eames’ head. Eames suspects that leg is the reason he ended up on the floor, but he isn’t sure. Also, he is having a difficult time breathing. But there is enough strength left in him to yank on the ankle presented so nicely to him until Arthur, too (still laughing), topples off of the couch. And… lands on top of him.

“Poorly planned revenge,” Eames gasps, what little air he'd had in the first place knocked out of him.

 

Arthur wheezes a laugh around the breath being knocked out of him. "At least I landed on a nice, soft cushion," he says, grinning. He almost gets a knee to the sternum for that one and laughs loudly again, trying to shove up and off the other man. He makes it to the space between Eames and the bed, rolling over to sit up and stare, out of breath and still grinning, at the forger.

"No one ever said you were good at planning, Mr. Fucking Unknown." This is slightly less out-of-breath, and is accompanied by a shit-eating grin.

 

Eames tries to glower at that, he really, really does. That was an insult and he has to glower, if only for a moment. Really, it’s required of him. But the expression doesn’t last more than a second before the narrowed eyes and scowl cracks around the edges, and a moment later, instead of glaring over at the other man, Eames is laughing again. Only this time it’s even louder than it had been a moment ago, more genuine even than the hysterics he’d had, the sort of laughter he rarely indulges in but just can’t be repressed.

Even through that, though, he can’t allow that to go unpunished, despite the fact that a laughing Arthur is thoroughly charming. There’s simply no way Eames can allow this, though. So, still laughing, Eames announces, “Git,” in a tone that is much too affectionate to be mistaken for real anger, and promptly tackles the other man.

 

Arthur is still caught up in his own hilarity, but he'd been ready for this, and he lets Eames throw his weight against him, redirecting it so that he can twist them around and land on top with a soft grunt... and then more snickering. "Git, oh, yes. Very British. Very thoughtful insult that," he gasps. "What does git even mean? At least call me something with an actual definition."

It's while he's getting all of that out that Eames manages to get a foot between his legs and flips them over again. He hits the carpet with an _oof_ and then starts laughing again. But this time, looking decidedly evil, he uses the hand he'd wrestled free to spider fingers up the forger's side, praying the man is ticklish. He has to be, because otherwise life would be impossibly unfair... because the point man _is_.

 

“Just because you Americans don’t comprehend the _nuances_ —“ Eames starts, but cuts off abruptly as soon as Arthur’s hand touches his side, the laughter that had already been fairly raucous turning into howls, maybe even gales, of laughter before Eames even has a moment to comprehend this unfair attack. Tickling? What is this?! Absolutely uncalled for, that’s what!

And Eames would say so, were he able to breathe even the slightest bit. But he isn’t, and the sudden and very evil attack has him barely able to keep from falling right on top of Arthur, let alone holding the other man down. So, as a last ditch effort, Eames resorts to turning the point man’s tactics on him in turn.

 

At this point, Arthur has to fight just to maintain his own attack, laughing hysterically (and rather breathlessly) as his body twists instinctively, trying to curl away from Eames' fingers. They can only keep this up for so long, until the point man is no longer actually making any sound as his chest and abdominal muscles convulse, and he quite literally shakes with laughter.

By the time they leave off, Eames has fallen partly on top of Arthur, who finds that he can't move for the life of him. All he manages, when Eames' fingers twitch on his stomach, is a weak little "Tee hee." And then a quiet cackle.

 

Despite the fact that this is somehow even more hilarious than the hysterical laughter coming from Arthur a moment before, the laugh that wants to come out doesn’t make it, and Eames is left half-gasping a snicker himself at this. Good Lord. Who knew that Arthur was _ticklish?_ Somehow that knowledge is both strangely intimate and odd as hell, but at the moment, Eames hardly cares. His revenge was had, sort of. And now he’s on top of Arthur, which is the sort of place he certainly likes to be.

Now if only he could breathe even a little. And stop twitching. Eames can’t recall the last time he was _tickled_ , literally cannot recall it, so the sheer exhaustion the hilarity created takes him by surprise. Eames doesn’t fight letting his head fall onto Arthur’s shoulder. “You are an evil man,” he finally chokes out, which would be much more convincing did it not taper off into a giggle.

 

"I try," Arthur wheezes, both from exertion and from Eames' weight on top of him. After a pause, he reaches down and tangles his fingers in Eames' hair. They stay there for a minute, rubbing his scalp absently, before he tugs gently, lifting the other man's head and kissing him with a low, content sort of noise, his own head lifting up slightly to get a better angle.

Still breathless, he pulls back, but only after a thorough exploration of the forger's mouth, aiming for his jaw. His voice is a bit muffled, but his amusement is quite audible as he asks, "If I'm the evil one, what does that make you?"

 

The first attempt at speech that comes out of Eames’ mouth isn’t precisely any sort of _word_ , although it had started out that way. Somewhere along the way it had turned into more of a noise than anything, incoherent and slightly gasped. Somehow, that gets him every time, and by now Arthur knows that very well. Very, _very_ well.

The second try comes after he arches into the other man a bit, arm shifting from where it had fallen bonelessly to curling around Arthur’s middle. Just in case he gets the funny idea that he might be going anywhere now. “Easily corruptible?” he tries, fighting a grin and losing.

 

"Must be," Arthur mumbles, the hand that's not pinned between them leaving the forger's hair and sliding down his side. He does some arching of his own, attaching his teeth to Eames' neck and grinning at the noise that provokes. "Guess I should do some more corrupting, then, since you seem to like it."

Needless to say, once again, they don't make it up onto the bed.

 

Not for the first time even in the last couple of days, Eames can’t help but stare up at the nearby couch, later, and wonder why they never seem to be able to make it to that at least. Or, crazier still, the bed, only yards away. It’s almost ridiculous, but he would never complain, despite the bruises and soreness. Actually maybe because of those things. They always make him feel accomplished. Even though it was really Arthur’s accomplishment. Maybe it’s just the reminder is nice. Eames isn’t sure.

“One of these times,” he says when he can finally think enough to say anything at all, lying curled up enough with Arthur to fit the two of them between the coffee table and the sofa, “one of us will think to move to the bed.” This is punctuated by an affectionate bite to the point man's shoulder, which with his head lying where it is, is just too close to ignore.

 

Arthur groans a little at the bite, but he doesn't disagree, even though his eyes don't open. Despite this, he still manages to snake an arm around Eames' shoulder, feeling quite smug, all things considered. He thinks he managed quite well, really. And he won't deny some pride in himself at the bruises that happen to be scattered on Eames' neck and back.

"Eventually. But this wasn't too bad." Opening his eyes a crack, now, he leans over and returns the bite, nipping at the other man's ear a bit less than gently. "I feel accomplished." Especially since he's still sore from the day before... twice.

 

Now it’s Eames’ turn to groan at this treatment. He can’t help but smile a bit at the fact that Arthur was thinking along exactly the same lines. It’s odd; there was a time when Eames would have just assumed that he and Arthur would never think along the same lines about _anything_. Then again, there was a time when he was completely convinced that Arthur would deck him if he made any serious advances. Eames finds that he is thoroughly pleased to have been so very wrong.

“As well you should, darling,” Eames mumbles, feeling very content, very pleasantly sore, and very tired. The odds of him moving from this spot before he falls asleep are very, very slim.

 

Arthur is also of a similar mind regarding this, and his eyes close again even as he predicts that they're going to be frozen if they fall asleep here. He doesn't care enough to work up the energy to move to the couch or the bed, however, and so he shifts only slightly, just enough to bury his face in Eames' hair, letting himself drift off.

Sure enough, however, he wakes in the middle of the night, freezing his ass off; his teeth are practically shattering as he sits up, trying to wake Eames enough to get them to the bed and under the covers. "Come on," he says hoarsely, tugging at the forger's arm. "You can't do the job if you've got pneumonia."

 

Only waking up because he’s trained himself to wake quickly- job requirement- Eames nevertheless is only _just_ awake, sensing no impending danger. On the other hand, he’s just awake enough to be annoyed that he’s awake. And freezing. Good Lord, he is freezing. That’s going to wake him up quickly, and Eames doesn’t appreciate this at all.

His unflattering mumbling about the job and pneumonia makes that clear, or it would have if it was even a little coherent. He allows Arthur to yank him partway up and then groans to his feet, stumbling with the other man to the bed, where they scramble under the covers… and still freeze. Eames knows from experience that he’ll warm up quickly; he always does. But Arthur is never as warm as he is. “This’s why w’should go to the bed _beforehand_.”

 

"T's not my fault you tackled me before we could get there," Arthur points out, eyes closing again as he shifts closer under the covers. He's perfectly content to blame their current predicament entirely on Eames, and he does so without remorse. "All your fault."

This, of course, does not deter him from seeking out what will undoubtedly soon be a much-warmer body beneath the covers. Shameless, him? Yeah, probably.

 

“Is not,” Eames mumbles, abruptly shivering as Arthur shares more his chills than any body warmth, but he doesn’t shove the other man away. As soon as he warms up again, Eames will be happy to warm Arthur up. He’s a little too tired and freezing to consider all the ways in which he might do so, which is made obvious as soon as he wraps his arms around Arthur’s middle.

This does nothing for their combined warmth, just yet, but then Eames pulls the blankets over their heads, covering them both head to toe and thrusting the world into darkness. “You deserved it.”

 

"Did I." Arthur moves closer, feeling Eames' arm around his waist tighten, and ends up speaking into the other man's shoulder. "I seem to recall differently." He yawns, his breath at least warm against Eames' skin. "You called yourself an unknown, rejecting plans of all kinds. Stupid to get insulted by what you called yourself."

He chuckles, then bites down gently before closing his eyes again. "Sorry if I hurt your feelings."

 

“Mm,” is the only thing that comes out after some effort, in response. After a moment, Eames gives it another shot, but only because he can’t let Arthur just get away with that. It’s just not how Eames works. “Not rejecting. Not _all_ plans.” That is not what he said and Arthur very well knows it. Eames accepts plans. He works with them. He throws off _other_ people’s plans. If he didn’t play well with others, he wouldn’t do so well on team jobs.

And Arthur knows very well that Eames _does_. It’s just that he’s very good at making things up as he goes. And as for hurting his feelings, well. Eames smiles a bit, despite being freezing. He’s already starting to warm up. This would go a bit faster if Arthur wasn’t all sorts of frigid, but Eames doesn’t let go of him. “You hurt all sorts of things, pet.” It might be pitch black under the blankets, but his grin is audible.

 

"Oh, really?" That wakes the point man up a bit, and he lifts his head a little, so that he's breathing on the skin he'd just bit, but not actually touching. "Want me to kiss it and make it better?"

Half-asleep or not, it doesn't take much brainpower to return to kissing and biting the forger's skin, leaving red marks in his wake as he slides downward again. Yes, he's aware that he's giving in, and the more he does this, the more Eames will think he can get him to capitulate easily. Or that harassing Arthur will have good consequences. But at the moment, he really doesn't care...

 

After that, they warm up _much_ more quickly than they might have otherwise, which isn’t much of a surprise. Eames is only barely awake enough to realize that he’d gotten his way, but waking up also happens quickly, and as he’s drifting off to sleep again later, Eames decides that harassing Arthur, as per usual, absolutely does have good consequences. There’s nothing Arthur could do to convince him otherwise, and in fact this just cements it in his mind.

The next morning Eames wakes again, curled up with Arthur under the covers and certainly not freezing. No pneumonia, either, which is not surprising. It takes Eames a few moments, but he manages to twist around and eye the clock; only about nine A.M., but he has work to do, because he has to meet some people today. The job is tomorrow night, and so the rest of the chips have to be finished, he has to go to meet with Rob, and then, he supposes, it’s just a matter of waiting.

Easy enough. Except now that it’s closing in on the end of the job… curling back into the spot he’d been in, Eames eyes Arthur, who is still asleep. Maybe it’s not odd that he doesn’t really want to leave. Although he’s _quite_ certain the people in the rooms next to this one will appreciate their departure.

 

Arthur wakes long after Eames does; he's probably still catching up on all the sleep he _hadn't_ gotten for a month, of course, or at least that's his excuse, but by the time he finally drags himself out of the bed (in an odd reversal of roles), it's nearing mid-afternoon and Eames is nowhere to be found. There are, however, several rows of finished fake poker chips lying on the desk, and Arthur doesn't touch those, not wanting to accidentally mess anything up.

His thoughts run in the same direction as Eames' had, once again; he looks around, eyeing the room and then the bed. After they leave here... who knows what'll happen? Another day of this and it will be time to go. He finds himself wishing they could stay here, in a limbo of their own, though not the shared-dream definition of the word, thankfully.

He can't go to the gym until Eames gets back, unless he doesn't want to be able to get back into the room, and so he stretches out on the couch again, turning on the news and settling in to wait, not bothering with more than sweatpants. Again. Christ, at this rate becoming a slob will be a habit by the time he leaves. He finds himself not... hating the idea, out of characteristic though he knows that is.

 

It’s only an hour or so later when Eames returns to find Arthur lying on the sofa wearing only sweatpants. This gets a smile out of the forger, who himself is wearing enough layers to survive the cold, hat and scarf included. He starts stripping these off immediately once he’s shut the door, eyeing the shirtless Arthur appreciatively. Eames has always enjoyed ogling Arthur, there’s no denying that. At least now he doesn’t get as many glares about it. Although he’s not certain that’s a bad thing…

“Good morning,” he says, sounding amused; Eames knows very well that Arthur sleeping in and him waking early is a very strange occurrence. Then again, Eames’ schedule is often not so much a schedule as his being awake until he can’t be anymore, and then waking whenever that happens to be. It just happens that all the fun things tend to happen at night, not at seven A.M..

“Sorry,” he says after he’s pulled off his coat; the sweater has made a comeback underneath that. “I ought to have left you the key.” It’s just habit to take it with him and leave it at the front desk.

 

More than slightly amused by the hat, Arthur watches him shed layers with a raised brow. "Don't worry about it. I didn't have anywhere to be." He'd changed the bandage on his arm, and that seems to be the extent of the activity he'd prefer to deal with today. "Just got up a little while ago."

His eyes return to the television after a minute, watching the more normal, local news; thankfully, there's nothing today that stirs up bad memories.

 

Eames, too, turns to glance at the television, but it’s all just local news. Nothing to worry anyone. Which is good. Because despite the fact that Arthur had never fully explained what it was that had kept him and everyone else in West Africa for a month, Eames isn’t sure he wants to know, and he is _very_ sure he doesn’t want Arthur to have to think about it twenty-four-seven. Some things you never really recover from, but… you deal.

Finally back to a normal amount of clothing, Eames wanders over to check the chips he’d finished on the desk (they’re good) before wandering over to sit on the edge of the sofa, which Arthur is doing a very good job of taking up all by himself. The newscaster is announcing something about baby animals at the nearby zoo. Eames can’t help but smirk a little. That’s all the news around here? Hmm. He can only hope this con doesn’t end up on the news for want of something interesting. But he doubts that. The casino won’t want the world knowing they were scammed.

“Newsworthy sort of day,” he mumbles when it turns to a follow-up story on nearby firefighters. Maybe they’re just tired of reporting on murders and burglaries and corrupt politicians.

 

"Apparently." Arthur looks away from the television, notes the sweater again, and rolls his eyes, not deigning to comment this time. It's really not worth the energy expenditure. He should, rather, just be pleased that the thing is not paisley. That much is a blessing.

And, truth be told, he doesn't honestly care as much about Eames' wardrobe as he lets on. Sure, it's good to have something with which to tease the other man, a constant, when Eames always seems to have a comment for _him_ , but he's not sure what he would do if the forger suddenly started dressing... well, like him. It would be strange. Like he'd stepped into the Twilight Zone. There's something distinctly Eames about his horrible shirts and suits, something that would be lost if he stopped dressing so ridiculously.

 

They stay watching the news mindlessly for a while, until finally Eames has had quite enough of listening to inane stories and stands, moving over to the chips on the desk. He’d already checked them several times; they look fine to him. And now a careful poke or two proves that they’re dry, as well, and so Eames sits down at the desk, pulling out a briefcase and starting to put them in with the rest he’d so carefully finished over the past few days.

Once that’s done, Eames spends a moment staring at the case. That’s done; now all there is to do is wait until tomorrow night. Normally this would produce a sense of excitement with a bit of nervousness, like waiting to go on before a show. Today he just feels a sense of losing time, a deadline on his heels. It strikes him as strangely similar to the end of the Fischer job, the week spent knowing exactly when it would be over and not knowing what would happen afterwards. The job doesn’t scare or bother Eames. It’s other things.

“Done,” he finally announces, pushing thoughts of that aside for now. “And right on time.”

 

"Right on time despite the fact that we still have a day," Arthur points out... and then pauses, looking up from the television to the forger. "You. You have a day." Habit, he supposes.

And then he'll leave for Paris or Berlin, and from there to New York. The trip will be a long one, but he doesn't suppose he's dreading the length of the travel time, really. He doesn't want to leave here. But that, he decides firmly, is just rather lazy of him, and he should get a grip on himself.

 

Eames turns to look at Arthur for a moment, at that, but doesn’t respond to the slip. He could probably say something… actually, Eames knows he _should_. But he doesn’t, because… why should he feel like this really isn’t about the job at all, but about how long before he has to get out of the country and Arthur has to go off, back to New York or London? And why should he find himself hoping that it’s the Big Apple and not London?

He shouldn’t, and so Eames says nothing about that, shrugging. “Strictly speaking,” he admits. “But I don’t like to be doing things down to the wire.” It has nothing to do with not having anything to worry about while he’s got Arthur here. Nothing at all.

He leaves that topic alone, both aloud and in his own head, and the rest of the day goes by strangely quickly. In fact, much of the night and next morning does as well until suddenly it’s Tuesday, and Eames finds himself waking up at noon, knowing that he’s not going to be waking up here again tomorrow morning. He’ll be long gone before Wednesday morning comes. And Arthur… well. Arthur will be gone, too. Somewhere else. Which is how these things work. Speaking of, Eames sits up, finding the point man already awake, which is comforting in a normal sort of fashion. Eames’ sleeping pattern is erratic. Arthur’s is not, normally, so when it starts to be like clockwork again, Eames finds himself partially relieved. “G’morning,” he mumbles through a yawn in Arthur’s general direction, refusing to move any further than sitting up and rubbing at tired eyes.

 

Looking up from the novel he'd picked up at the store the day before, Arthur raises a brow, amused and trying not to think about how attractive a just-woken Eames happens to be. "Good morning," he returns, even though it's technically no longer morning. The forger will have a long night, and Arthur... has spent the morning trying very hard not to think about the fact that he will have to leave this afternoon.

He's spent enough time musing on that, he believes, and so he's kept his mind rather determinedly on other things; there hadn't been anything to pack, since he'd arrived with nothing but the clothes on his back, but he'd managed a load of laundry in the laundromat across the street, and his clothes are... well, as clean as they're going to be.

"We should get food," he points out, finding himself fidgeting for the first time in... years, he thinks. He's not a fidgeter. He's not antsy. He's calm, and collected, always. This strange behavior can feel free to halt itself at any time.

 

Not nearly awake enough to take notice of this, Eames eyes Arthur blearily. Food, food, right. That is a thing you do, because it is actually about lunchtime. Of course, the official times one should eat mean very little to Eames when he wakes up at noon, but food is rather a priority anyway. After all, the odds of him eating much of anything the rest of the day are slim.

“Does this involve getting up?” he asks in a mutter, but he’s doing exactly that as he says it. Obviously the idea of food isn’t a bad one. It’s just that he doesn’t particularly want to get out of bed.

 

Arthur presses his lips together to hide his smirk, but he can't completely conceal his amusement. Or his interest, as he watches Eames finally make it out from under the covers and head for the bathroom, completely unclothed. Arthur will admit that this is a very interesting sight. Very interesting. In the sense that he is very interested.

But food is the priority, he reminds himself. They can come back here and have all the fantastic sex they want, after he gets something in his stomach. For the moment, he will merely appreciate the picture of Eames wandering about without clothes on. But this state doesn't last very long, alas, since they're planning on leaving the hotel room, and so when Eames appears again, clothed, he sighs a bit, standing and pulling on his coat. His wallet is in his pocket, and he tucks his book in, as well. It had hit him, when he'd been dressing, that he hadn't actually arrived with anything else. It's a bit of a sad thing, to know that when he goes to leave, he won't even have a bag with him.

 

Not missing the sigh, Eames sends Arthur a shameless grin, pulling his own coat on as well. He doesn’t know where exactly they’re going- there are a few places around here- but anywhere they go is going to require going outside. Which is going to be freezing. No doubt about it. But better that than eating in here again; they’ve been in here for days with very little venturing out, and Eames supposes that should probably stop eventually, even though he knows that Arthur’s going to be leaving soon, and when he leaves for the casino, that’ll be the last time he comes back here.

They leave in short order, and Eames wanders locks the door behind them, key in his pocket. For once, he’ll keep that with him, mainly because he doesn’t want to go to the front and draw attention to Arthur. No one at the front desk had seen him, so far, so there won’t be a chance of Arthur being recognized as connected to him, in the event that he’s caught.

“Where to?” he asks as they start off. Arthur is, after all, the man with the plan.

 

"I don't know." Arthur's hands are shoved into his own pockets, and he leads the way out of the hotel, not having had a specific destination in mind. He'd really just intended to use the time to talk to Eames, or just... well, spend this time together. They're walking down the sidewalk, shoulders not brushing because every few seconds, one of them has to shift out of the way of a puddle, when it happens. Arthur isn't entirely sure _why_ it happens at all, really, aside from the fact that he apparently is losing his mind. It's not a long process, though; it seems to happen in about five seconds. This, of course, is about the time it takes to speed up a stride, step in front of Eames, and stop there, facing the other man.

The forger stops, blinking at him, but Arthur is staring at him, refusing to look away, holding his gaze. His expression is unreadable.

"I think," he says slowly, voice very thoughtful, "I might be in love with you." His gaze is steady, and he's watching Eames without flinching or faltering. It's said, now, despite all of his mental insistance that he would not voice the words. Now they're out in the open, and somehow... it's freeing, as though a weight has been lifted from his chest. "It feels different than I've felt before. Stronger."

 

It turns out five seconds is also about all the time it takes for Eames’ stomach to drop uncomfortably, like he’d suddenly stepped onto a roller coaster and no one had warned him ahead of time. And while Arthur seems to be intent on holding his gaze, Eames finds himself trying, wanting more than anything, to look away, suddenly terribly, horribly uncomfortable with meeting the other man’s eyes, but he can’t. Because if he looks away, he won’t be able to tell if Arthur is fucking with him. Even though Eames knows there is no way in hell that Arthur would fuck with him like this. That would be beyond either of them.

Eames’ next conclusion, deciding that Arthur isn’t fucking with him, is to be grateful that his hand is in his pocket already, because that’s where his totem is. But a test… no. This isn’t a dream. This is reality, or he’s hallucinating. Which has happened before, but not when he’s been sober, it’s just—this is just— Eames has no idea. He has no idea what this is, or why it feels like someone has punched him in the stomach.

He should have known, Eames thinks distantly, that this was—when Arthur was drunk, when he’d called him love, and Arthur had asked... on the surface, Arthur seems so proper and distant, but Eames knows, he knows Arthur is better at—at the sort of things—he was friends with Cobb, and Ariadne, but Eames never was, he never had that. But he’s never slept with a colleague, either, he’s never continued things like this, not like this. He’s slept with the same person when they cross paths, yeah, but never… like this. He doesn’t know. No one has ever come close to saying this sort of thing to him, and if they had, Eames has the feeling he wouldn’t have frozen and panicked. Which, Eames realizes belatedly, he is definitely doing.

Why is this different? What is he supposed to say? To _do_? Why hadn’t he seen this coming and then gone, like he’d thought he should, why didn’t he stop himself wondering if maybe it _was_ love because it can’t possibly be. If it was anyone, it would be Arthur—but no. But it _can’t_ be. Because if he says it is and then it isn’t—or if it was and then tomorrow he’s not even here anymore, gone— gone like he should be right now but he can’t, he just _can’t_.

“Arthur…” he starts, feeling as trapped as if the other man had him by the shoulders and was holding him in place. His voice comes out small and distinctly un-Eames-like, and he swallows, finally managing to drag his eyes away, looking anywhere but at the point man, even though he is so close that it makes looking away both difficult and awkward. Eames isn’t used to feeling awkward or uncertain. He doesn’t like it. “I-I don’t— why--” He cuts himself off. He’s not going anywhere with that. He has no idea what he was trying to say, can’t gauge what he’s feeling right now well enough to express it, which is also not like him. In fact, right now he feels very much not like Eames at all, which is odd, because he doesn’t feel like anyone else, either.

 

It would take an idiot not to feel like a complete and total asshole, looking at Eames right now, and Arthur is not an idiot. Nor is he a cruel, vindictive bastard, but he's beginning to feel like one as he watches expressions he can't decipher beyond _holy hell not good_ flit across the forger's face. Eames looks like someone has punched him in the face and then possibly stabbed his mother to death, and Arthur takes a small step backward, guilt filling him.

He shouldn't have said anything. He knew it. He should have kept his damned mouth shut, should've... He's a moron. Fuck. He's fucked it all up- one look at Eames' face is enough to tell him that.

"I don't know why," he says quietly, unsure of what to say that wouldn't make this worse. Is it possible to make it worse? He feels like it is, and he could.

 _Idiot. Moron. Fool._ "I just... I didn't... I'm sorry. I didn't mean to... Forget I said anything. Eames..." He reaches up, means to just put a hand on the other man's shoulder, the sort of thing that's perfectly appropriate between two men, even in public on the street in Kiev, only meant as a comforting thing, but the forger flinches before he can touch him... and Arthur flinches right back. His mouth opens, but he can't seem to muster words. Finally, "Look, let's just go... get food." He turns, starts to lead the way to the next intersection.

 

Eyes wide and looking more frightened than anything, Eames watching Arthur turn, panic filling him, right along with a horrible surge of guilt, because he knows, he _knows_ that was not the way he should have reacted, he knows that that was all wrong. You don’t go _mental_ when someone like Arthur confesses something like that to you, you don’t—he doesn’t deserve Eames to be behaving like this, it’s just—

For a moment, Eames nearly has himself convinced that he should hurry after the other man, stop him, and—and, he doesn’t know. Return the feeling? Can he? _Should_ he? Except the guilt is still there, because he can’t just do that because he thinks Arthur deserves it, because he _wants_ things to be like that, because that’s just—that’s just not—Arthur deserves the _real thing_ and there is nothing _real_ about Eames, there never has been and there never will be. He should never have… he should have just left Arthur alone, he should have known better, he shouldn’t have, the Fischer job, he shouldn’t have then and he _definitely_ shouldn’t have in Miami, and then here, here, he should never have let Arthur in. He had _so many_ chances to do the right thing and he cocked it all up and now this is _his_ fault.

Even feeling like the world’s biggest arsehole, Eames can’t make his feet carry him after Arthur. Even wanting to, he can’t do it. He has never handled guilt particularly well, and that feeling sits festering in his gut for long seconds that feel even longer until suddenly all of this feels very distant, and Eames realizes very vaguely that he has a job to do tonight and then—and then he can leave, and that… that’ll do it, because it always does.

 

Arthur reaches the corner and peers at the traffic, deciding that any attempt at jaywalking is probably suicidal, and turns back to Eames, ready to try to say something, anything, to make it better. But when he looks over... and then back... there's no Eames.

Now he spins, looking around, back where they were- across the street- both ways- no Eames. He's... vanished.

Arthur's feet start moving before he tells them to, first hurrying back the thirty or so feet down the sidewalk, and then running. He looks in doorways, turns in a circle... sees nothing. His heart is thudding in his chest, and his breath is short, but he doesn't even realize that he's panicking. "Eames!"

Nothing. A few heads turn to look at him, but he can't see Eames' coat, or his hat- distantly, he realizes that if the forger is running, the first thing he'd do is lose the hat, lose the coat, and his eyes snap around again, searching for a man Eames' height, with Eames' build, his shoulders- "EAMES!"

No. No, no... Don't do this. Don't do this. He repeats it like a mantra, hurrying down the sidewalk and peering down alleys, moving fast, because he of all people knows how fast it's possible to disappear on a street like this. " _EAMES, DAMMIT!_ "

There's a familiar gray beanie in the slush next to a storefront, and he bends down to pick it up, ignoring the filthy water. His mind feels numb, suddenly, and he has to fight back the urge to scream. Possibly punch someone, or throttle the forger. Or himself. He'd throttle himself if he could, right now.

Quick, crazy plans start half-forming in his head. He could go to the casino tonight, find him, assuming he hasn't already started on his way out of Kiev. He could go back to the hotel. The poker chips are there, all of his shit is there, he'd go back for it. He could... go to the airport, stake it out, wait until the next day, go to the train station, he could...

No.

He'd run. Dammit, Arthur, the fucking idiot that he is, had made him run. For a reason, obviously, and that reason had looked suspiciously like horror. Because he, Arthur, is a moron. A fool. Definitely a fool. And he'd be even more of a fool to go after Eames right now. Or... ever. His face is like stone as he turns, starts off down the street again, shoving the hat into his pocket.

 


End file.
